Riding the wind of rebirth

Due to his family background, Zheng Zhang Shangfang failed to get into university, but with his love for linguistics, he devoted a long time to self-study in the Wenzhou Library. Later, he repeatedly claimed that he graduated from the "Wenzhou Library University."

Although he mainly relied on self-study, his later ability to become a master of phonology was closely related to the tradition of phonology.

This subject is so unpopular that once a good seedling like Zhou Zhi appears, all the bigwigs will take care of him all the way. At that time, Zheng Zhang Shangfang also received help and care from many people.

Although Zhou Zhi didn't know Zheng Zhang Shangfang before, the two of them had done almost the same thing.

Zhou Zhi completely dispelled Gu Youwen's doubts with the two books "Field Investigation Report on Jiachuan Dialect" and "Exegesis of Jiachuan Dialect" and accepted him as his disciple.

More than 30 years ago, Zheng Zhangshangfang, then 27 years old, was fearless and wrote a 100,000-word "Wenzhou Dialect Compilation Plan and Syllable Outline" and sent it to the Institute of Linguistics, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Unexpectedly, the then director of the Institute of Linguistics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and a famous linguist, Lu Shuxiang, personally reviewed and approved his writing plan. Taking into account that Zheng Zhang Shangfang did not have a stable job at the time, the Institute of Linguistics even specially approved and remitted him 100 yuan for paper and pen expenses.

In 1962, one hundred yuan was a very generous remuneration for an article.

That’s not all. Mr. Lu also remitted him ten yuan every month from his salary to help him solve his living problems.

  At that time, Zheng Zhang Shangfang was still a temporary teacher, and Mr. Lu was an internationally renowned expert. The two did not meet Mr. Lu for the first time until eighteen years later, when Zheng Zhang Shangfang went to the capital to revise the manuscript!

There is also a legendary story about how Zheng Zhangshangfang met Mr. Wang Li. At that time, Mr. Wang Li wrote the phonetics part of "Draft History of Chinese Language". Zheng Zhangshangfang had the opportunity to see it, so he wrote to Wang Li to give some opinions and suggestions for some changes.

Who is Wang Li? He is a Chinese linguist, educator, translator, essayist, and poet. He graduated from Tsinghua University, studied in France, taught at Peking University for five or six years, and was appointed as a member of the Philosophy and Social Sciences Department of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. He is the founder of modern Chinese linguistics.

At that time, Zheng Zhangshangfang was just a teacher at a private middle school in a remote county suburb, a real nobody. However, the great scholar took the nobody's advice very seriously and appreciated it very much. He wrote back in his own handwriting: "I think it is very rare that you have mastered phonology without a teacher. You have many good suggestions. The song part should be changed to [ai]. You are right."

In this way, the two sides established a friendship regardless of age difference.

The same goes for the great scholar Wang Fushi, who started out by investigating the Xuanhua dialect and later focused on investigating and researching minority languages. He was an expert in Miao and Yao language studies and also made contributions to the study of Chinese dialects. At the time, he was a researcher at the Institute of Ethnology, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

In order to study ancient phonetics, Zheng Zhang Shangfang specially taught himself the basic vocabulary materials of Korean, Vietnamese, Thai, Cambodian, Japanese and other minority languages ​​of my country, such as Tibetan, Miao and Zhuang. Because many of my country's neighboring countries were promoting Chinese studies and Chinese characters in ancient times, Goryeo, Nanyue and island countries all used Chinese characters for education, and their current pronunciation generally maintains that of the Tang Dynasty, and some words are from the Han Dynasty.

During the research process, Zheng Zhang Shangfang encountered some problems, so he wrote to Mr. Wang Fushi for advice. Mr. Wang Fushi wrote him a 19-page long letter, and his love for talent was evident.

Later, many senior scholars such as Yuan Jiahua, Li Rong and other famous linguists also repeatedly answered his questions and solved his doubts. Eventually, he became a linguist.

Talking about this, Zhou Zhi felt a bit amused and helpless. He thought he was quite smart in terms of learning, but it seemed that his predecessors had already done almost everything he had done.

What's even funnier is that he once flaunted it in front of Mr. Gu, but Mr. Gu just smiled and changed the subject. Now thinking back, Mr. Gu actually knew all this a long time ago, but he just watched him perform silently and never said anything.

"Grandpa Master, I find you are a little unkind sometimes." Zhou Zhi complained, "You just let me go on my own and didn't even tell me the experience of the seniors."

"Knowledge gained from books is always shallow. You must practice it yourself to truly understand it." The old man smiled and said, "These are all your own ideas. Although they can no longer be considered original creations, they are still the insights of heroes. Their yesterday is your today, and their today may not be your tomorrow."

It's amazing. After learning about the research methods of the two predecessors who were as awe-inspiring as mountains, Zhou Zhi actually felt that what his grandfather said was not without reason. The masters also made their achievements step by step through down-to-earth research. As long as the methods are right and the people are not stupid and persevere, after forty or fifty years of accumulation, the achievements should be extraordinary.

However, although he no longer revered the achievements of his predecessors like gods, Zhou Zhi still couldn't imagine achieving that level. The reason was very simple, that is, he couldn't be as focused as his predecessors and "master one thing and be the best in the world."

He has too many distractions.

Fortunately, he is not without any advantages. First of all, he has new methods, approaches and technologies, especially the application of information technology, which is unmatched by his predecessors.

The second is the support of the times. For a long time, the humanities and social sciences were not valued by the country and society, and were even suppressed for a long time. Now it is different.

Although the country still attaches more importance to science, with the growth of national strength, the country has also made a series of major moves, at least in some humanities and social sciences within its capabilities.

For example, the largest volumes nowadays are "Confucian Canon", "Daoist Canon" and "Buddhist Canon".

The academic environment is completely different.

There is also financial resources, including the country’s financial resources, the school’s financial resources, and most importantly, Zhou Zhi’s own financial resources.

For Zhou Zhi today, studying is done out of interest and hobby, and he is happy even if he has to pay for it. With such financial strength, Zheng Zhang Shangfang, who had to go out to sea to fish if he wanted to study, and relied on the ten yuan a month sent by Lu Shuxiang from the capital to subsidize his life, could not compare with it.

The so-called "poor are good at literature but rich are good at martial arts" refers to personal learning. In ancient times, this sentence meant that poor people could not even get enough food to eat, so they could not rely on physical strength to succeed and could only use their brain power.

Only rich people can afford to keep horses, buy weapons, and hire coaches, which are the basis of learning martial arts.

But it is different when it comes to cultural projects. They are often completed only during the heyday of the dynasty. For example, the Yongle Encyclopedia of Emperor Yongle, the Complete Collection of Ancient and Modern Books of Emperor Kangxi and Emperor Yongzheng, and the Complete Library of Four Treasures of Emperor Qianlong are not "poor literature". They must be rich, and they must be rich to the height of the dynasty. (End of this chapter)