A Summer Reading List I Drew Up for My Son

My son has recently become interested in works of anthropology and social psychology. Perhaps he cannot really understand such books yet, and his interest may spring from some peculiar teenage psychology, but he has taken to these books on our shelves.

Yet I recall that when I first read this kind of book myself, I was equally bewildered; after a period of reading, though, it began to make sense. So I still encourage him to read, and I bought him some books that look rather strange.

At home I have works of anthropology and history such as The Story of Civilization, Global History, and the Naked Ape trilogy, as well as whole sets of books on psychology, developmental psychology, and social psychology. I have bought electronic editions of as many as I could and downloaded them to his Kindle for him to read at any time.

In addition I bought him a miscellany of books: History of Chinese Warfare, History of Cultural Relics in China, popular historical romances, the Very Short Introductions series, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, The Story of Psychology, A Short History of the World's Religions, A Short History of Chinese Philosophy, A Short History of World War II, A History of Asia, Archaeology, and A History of the World's Religions. For most I bought both paper and electronic editions so he can read whenever he likes.

Although a fourteen-year-old reading such speculative works is a little early, as long as the child shows interest I will support him. Whether he merely wants to learn something to drop in conversation and look impressive and feed his vanity, or has a genuine thirst for knowledge, I will support him. Open a book and there is profit; no effort is wasted. As long as he is willing to read, these books will play some role in his life.

Most Chinese parents are overly anxious. Most still prefer to send their children to cram schools so they score higher and rank better on exams, get into a good university, and secure a good future; hence they do not encourage children to read this sort of miscellaneous book, which might take up so much of their time. But my own life experience tells me that reading such miscellaneous books is of great benefit to a person's whole life.

I was fortunate to be taught by many fine teachers. The one who influenced my life most, when I was still a hot-blooded youth, urged me to "be broad in antiquity and the modern, and to integrate China and the West." He was a learned teacher of Chinese literature with a very rich library at home; under his guidance I read widely from his collection while still in middle school. My own decent writing ability today owes much to his cultivation.

My teacher's education, though it seemed casual, was never scattered. He could always see where my problems lay and sense where my interests lay, so the extracurricular books he handed me were always the ones I loved to read.

As long ago as twenty-plus years he had insight into what my future suited me for, and he laid a solid humanistic foundation for me. On the question of my own son's education I once consulted him too; the general principle he set for me was to expand the child's reading range in stages, following the child's interests.

Nowadays my son is like me in many ways: with strong logical and computational ability he leans toward the sciences in schoolwork, yet he is also very interested in the humanities, social sciences, and history. He is simply tired of the dry, tedious history and politics taught in school; he prefers to read real, thought-through classics of ideas, history, and the social sciences rather than those manufactured for education—even though his ideal is to become a scientist, not a writer or a thinker.

I deeply respect this "bent" of his. I hope he will have a broad horizon and, through a deep understanding of humankind's sojourn on earth and of human nature itself, ultimately reach a state of calm and detachment.

From my own experience I know that if a person cannot understand human nature at its deepest level, his breadth of mind will never be truly wide. And without a broad mind one is always pulled about by emotions, hard put to reach detachment and calm.

As long as a person is ruled by greed, craving, ill will, groundless suspicion, arrogance, and prejudice, his life will be full of unhappy moments. To rise above one's emotions and at last become a person of inner peace and happiness requires a compassion grounded in deep understanding of human nature.

Christianity says there is nothing new under the sun. When we understand society, ourselves, and life from the level of human nature, we find that across all ages and lands there is indeed nothing new. Such a deep understanding of human nature can be achieved by reading works of history, psychology, philosophy, and religion, and by accumulating life experience. Books enlighten; that saying is never wrong.

I have my own views on education, and I will educate my son according to my own ideas rather than according to the demands of exam-oriented schooling.

Life lasts a hundred years—neither very long nor very short. To live those hundred years well, a person needs some survival skills and some wisdom of living. Making a living matters, but not so much that everything else must be sacrificed to it.

Human beings also have a mind; if they cannot steer that mind, life will be very hard. Yet steering it well is no easy task. Since ancient times many people have accumulated rich experience in mastering their own inner world, and that experience lies scattered across the classics of the humanities and social sciences. Reading more such books gives one many more tools of thought, so that when all sorts of life problems arise in future, one will not be at a loss.

So for my son I pass on both practical, skills-based knowledge and a broader intellectual horizon. I accompany and love him, yet I also require him to work, to understand and respect others, and to become self-supporting as early as he can. My own knowledge and time are limited, but the resources in the treasury of human civilization are boundless. As a father I am glad to be his guide in this, just as my own beloved teacher once was my guide and spiritual mentor.