Great Master of the Tang Dynasty

Chapter 59 60 Zuo's Fairy Tales and Zuo's Pinyin

In the following days, in addition to drawing ship drawings, Zuo Ming published a comic again.

This time, Zuo Ming still publishes children's books, but this time, this one has a lot of content, and almost gathers "Andersen's Fairy Tales", "Aesop's Fables", "Grimm's Fairy Tales" and "Arabian Nights". All masterpieces.

These include "The Ugly Duckling", "The Thirsty Crow", "The Fox and the Grapes", "Snow White" and "Aladdin and the Magic Lamp".

The readings published this time are obviously for enlightenment education, so Zuo Ming did not use the form of full comics, but interspersed a lot of text in the comics.For the convenience of reading, Zuo Ming even marked the pronunciation in pinyin on those words.

Once this book called "Zuo Shi's Fairy Tales" went on sale, it immediately aroused great repercussions.Because the illustrations of this book are very simple, thousands of pirated copies appeared in a very short period of time.

Wang Siyan was very angry about this, but Zuo Ming chuckled lightly, enjoying himself.

The reason why he made the illustrations so simple is to facilitate rubbing and piracy.

With his current net worth, he doesn't care about these little money, and if he is distracted from publishing a book, he will definitely delay a lot of business, and the gain outweighs the loss.It would be better to give those impoverished scholars a livelihood.

However, Zuo Ming obviously underestimated the impact of this book.

Just three months after the book was published, Zuo Ming was surprised to find that the story of Snow White and Cinderella had begun to be staged in many theaters in the Tang Dynasty!
This point really didn't even occur to Zuo Ming himself.After hearing the news, Lian'er and Hu Ke ignored him for three days.

Can they not be angry?The person who published the book was their husband-in-law, but in the end, his Anle Theater was the last theater to produce fairy tales, and I don't know how many colleagues were watching their jokes.

It's just that they were angry, so why didn't Zuo Ming feel so depressed?Conscience of heaven and earth, he just published a bedtime reading, how could he think that these things can also be rehearsed into a drama?
However, when Zuo Ming was very speechless and helpless, the arrival of an old man made him feel much better.

This person is none other than his old neighbor Kong Yingda.

This descendant of Confucius did not come empty-handed, but brought a lot of gifts. Of course, the gifts here are definitely not yellow and white, but some famous calligraphy and paintings and precious books.

This kind of thing is definitely not practical at all, but it is very good for decoration, so for the rich man Zuo Ming, it is very satisfactory.

Kong Yingda came here with a lot of gifts, so of course he didn't just come here to drop by. He came this time, in fact, for Zuo Ming's pinyin notation.

Since the publication of "Zuo Shi's Fairy Tales", most people have not noticed this strange symbol, but he, Kong Yingda, has noticed it.Not only did he notice it, but he also saw that it was actually a note on pronunciation, but as smart as he was, he couldn't fully interpret those letters and phonetic symbols.Therefore, he could only run over to ask a junior like Zuo Ming for advice.

The descendants of the sage Confucius asked for the usage of pinyin, and Zuo Ming was naturally happy to teach it.

Kong Yingda is worthy of being a great Confucian in the world, but he has learned the method of pinyin thoroughly in just a cup of tea.And what surprised Zuo Ming even more was that this seemingly dull old man actually came up with a clever plan to use Chinese characters to annotate the pronunciation of letters!
As soon as this method came out, this pinyin notation method no longer required Zuo Ming to teach it hand in hand, and within a short period of time, it became a must-read for young children throughout the Tang Dynasty.

Moreover, Kong Yingda is a kind person. When the Hanzi interpreted the printed pinyin letters, it turned out to be the name of Guan's Zuo Ming.

Ever since, due to the promotion of "Zuoshi's Fairy Tales" and "Zuoshi's phonetic notation", Zuo Ming's name has also spread all over the country.

Afterwards, Li Shimin personally brought the King of Jin, Li Zhi, to the Zuo Mansion to worship Zuo Ming as his teacher.And looking at this posture, it turned out that he wanted Li Zhi to live in Zuofu in the future.

Li Shimin's sudden arrival really caught Zuo Ming by surprise.Zuo Ming really couldn't figure it out, Li Zhi was only five years old now, how could Li Shimin and Empress Changsun be willing to hand him over to him?

However, in front of so many people, Zuo Ming really couldn't refuse, so he could only agree.Otherwise, Li Shimin's face will definitely not look good.

When he first came to Zuofu, Li Zhi obviously hadn't gotten rid of some stinking problems in the palace.Not to mention picky eaters, but also likes to play temper.

However, after being beaten up several times by Zuo Ming, this kid finally knew who was the boss in Zuo Mansion.

Don't look at Li Zhicai is only five years old. This kid is really good at making small reports. He actually learned the trick of "Clothing Belt Edict" and asked his guards to carry a crooked letter, and then handed it to Empress Zhangsun !
When he saw the letter with a lot of typos, Zuo Ming's nose was so angry. If some of the characters hadn't used the Chinese pinyin he taught, he would have smashed Li Zhi's ass.

Empress Changsun was also angry and funny, but she put away the letter, planning to let Li Zhi see his masterpiece when he grew up.

At the end of March, the first sweet potatoes and potatoes in the greenhouse are finally ready for harvest.

In view of Zuo Ming boasting about Haikou, saying that potatoes and sweet potatoes can produce [-] shi per mu, Li Shimin not only called a group of ministers, but also specially asked him to come here.

For Zuo Ming, needless to say, all the ministers are already very familiar with him.They haven't finished reading Zuo Ming's "Zuo Shi's Fairy Tale" until now, and the more they read it, the more interesting it becomes, so when they see him, they all call out "Master Zuo", "Master Zuo", and let Zuo I was ashamed for a while.

"My son-in-law, when the potatoes are produced, His Majesty will definitely find trouble with you. You have to be patient, there are so many people here, no more private than you and Your Majesty"

After seeing the ceremony, Wang Gui took a chance and whispered to Zuo Ming.

During this period of time, he had heard Wang Siyan, who had gone home to visit his relatives, talk about Zuo Ming contradicting the emperor many times. Wang Siyan was proud of what he said, but Wang Gui was terrified when he heard it.He only felt that his son-in-law was the most stunned young man in the world, and he had to prevent some things in advance, otherwise, his Wang family would be implicated sooner or later.

After hearing this, Zuo Ming was really speechless.

This old man is too shameful, it's fine if you don't believe in yourself, does your son-in-law look like "Shabi"?

But even though he was full of sadness in his heart, Zuo Ming promised, but only God knows how much sincerity there is.

"Lord Zuo, you asked Qingque to tell me that the potatoes and sweet potatoes can yield fifty shi per mu, and now the harvest is imminent. Do you have anything to say?"

Zuo Ming has been rumored to be miraculous now, and Li Shimin made it clear that he wanted to slap him in the face and kill him.

"Your Majesty! My minister warmly congratulates Your Majesty once again. From then on, there are two more high-yielding grains! From now on, my Great Tang will only have pigs that die of laziness, and no people will die of starvation."

Zuo Ming smiled lightly and said very playfully.

His words are not exaggerated. With the population of Tang Dynasty and this vast and boundless land, there are two things, potatoes and sweet potatoes. If you starve to death, you must be lazy.

This kind of thing is high-yielding, durable, and not afraid of locusts. Coupled with the promotion of greenhouses, it would be unreasonable for people in Datang to starve to death.

Seeing that Zuo Ming is full of confidence, Li Shimin only thinks that he is stubborn.After all, fifty shi per mu is no different from a myth.

Artillery is enough of a myth, but compared to this, it is nothing more than a small witch.

"I hope it will be as the adults say!"

Li Shimin smiled softly.He likes to call "Zuo Ming" "Master Zuo" rather than "Zuo Aiqing", because it seems that he will have a sense of victory in his heart.

After saying this, Li Shimin commanded a group of imperial forest troops to start harvesting potatoes and sweet potatoes.

Li Shimin was really too careful. From the farm workers to the guards in this greenhouse, they were all guards of the Imperial Forest Army.

Harvesting potatoes and sweet potatoes is a heavy task. Out of boredom, Zuo Ming came to the next field, picked a tomato and ate it.

This is the first time he has tasted the taste of tomatoes this year, and it is a pure natural and pollution-free tomato. The taste is really amazing.

"Can this food be eaten raw?" Li Shimin asked curiously seeing Zuo Ming eating happily there.

"Of course! Do you want to pay for one, Your Majesty?"

Zuo Ming nodded, and said with an expression of "you don't know".

Li Shimin was a little moved, after all, it was a new thing, and being the first to taste it was something worth showing off.

Li Shimin's heart was moved, and Eunuch Qian acted immediately.Not long after, a peeled tomato was delivered to Li Shimin.

A faint sour taste entered the mouth, and Li Shimin's eyes lit up immediately.

This taste is completely different from the numbing taste of Zuo Ming's pepper chicken, but it has the same effect.He didn't know until now that sourness can also be a kind of delicacy.

After Li Shimin tasted it, he naturally wanted to ask those ministers who were tempted but didn't speak up in consideration of the etiquette of the emperor and ministers to pay for it.

"My son-in-law, besides eating raw, how else can I eat these tomatoes?"

After tasting it, everyone was full of praise, and Wang Gui asked directly, relying on his own identity.

"Reporting to Master Taishan! The most common way to cook these tomatoes is to mix them with oil and salt to flip eggs, which is not only appetizing, but also rich in nutrition. What's more, it is also very good as a dessert before or after meals."

Regarding this, Zuo Ming naturally did not hide it, but after he finished speaking, he added, "Speaking of which, these tomatoes and sweet potatoes first appeared in a place called South America, where it should be said to be a deserted area. The Land of the Lord is right, I really didn't expect that I could inadvertently receive these two treasures from two ignorant barbarians."

The faces of all the ministers changed when they heard this. As Li Shimin's close ministers, they must have read Zuo Ming's "Shan Hai Zhi".

Originally, they and Li Shimin had already been thinking about those two lands in private, but now they suddenly heard that the tomatoes and sweet potatoes came from South America. How could they not be surprised?
"You mean that someone might have been to South America?"

Finally, Li Shimin spoke with a gloomy face.

(End of this chapter)