Childhood

When I Was Five Years Old, I Read A Novel of 300,000 Words

It was the only book I could find other than Mao’s selection at that time

Believe it or not that the first book since I knew Chinese characters was neither a fairy tale nor a fantasy story, nor even an illustration, but a documentary novel for adults.

It was a book about a well-known hero in China in the 1960s. He intercepted a frightened horse who rushed onto the train track, saved more than 600 passengers, but was caught under the wheels of the train and lost his life.

In addition to telling the hero’s feat, the book also spent a large amount of ink describing how he grew up as a communist fighter.

For a five-year-old child who just started school, it was difficult reading. At first, I entangled the adults in my family whenever I encountered a word that I didn’t know. Later, the adults were annoyed by my endless questions so that they taught me how to use the dictionary.

Since then I looked up the dictionary or just jumped over by encountering new words. I don’t remember how long did it take till I devoured the 300,000-word novel.

Looking back today, I questioned whether I really understood what the author wanted to convey when I was five years old, but for sure I have enjoyed reading a lot.

According to my parent, I couldn’t put the book down at that time, and I was also very quiet when reading.

My childhood was in an era when both material and spirit were extremely scarce. However, being interested in stories belongs to part of curiosity that represents human nature.

No matter how hard the environment is, as long as we are not hungry, we will not stop being curious. And reading is one way to satisfy our curiosity.

Times are different. Today, children have plenty of choices by reading. Open Google, there are countless types of children’s books, including fantasy, horror, and fairy tales that I could only dream of as a child, which made me envied back then.

If possible, I would like to send colorful illustrated books and sets of children’s stories to me when I was five years old.

Thank you, Ellie Jacobson for this prompt. In the following story, she asked a question: What are your earliest memories in relationship to stories?

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