苏洵的一生行迹（1009-1066）
苏洵，字明允，号老泉，眉州眉山人，北宋著名散文家，与子苏轼、苏辙并称"三苏"，位列唐宋八大家。二十七岁始发愤读书，文章雄健犀利，尤善政论，著有《权书》《衡论》等，对宋代古文运动贡献卓著。
眉山（1009） · 眉山少时
宋真宗大中祥符二年，苏洵出生于眉州眉山县纱縠行，其父苏序为乡绅，家道殷实。苏洵少时不喜读书，好游侠任气，与其兄苏澹、苏涣性格迥异，乡人皆以为不肖之子。
眉山（1036） · 发愤苦读
宋仁宗景祐三年，苏洵二十七岁，应进士试落第后深受刺激，始发愤读书。此前他游荡多年，屡试不中，此次落第令他幡然悔悟，将以前所作文章尽焚之，闭户苦读六七年，贯通经史百子。
开封（1056） · 游学四方
宋仁宗嘉祐元年，苏洵携二子苏轼、苏辙赴开封应试，谒见翰林学士欧阳修。苏洵呈上《权书》《衡论》等文章二十二篇，欧阳修读后大为赞赏，将其文章上呈仁宗，从此苏洵文名震动京师，士大夫争相传抄。
开封（1057） · 名动京师
宋仁宗嘉祐二年，苏轼、苏辙同榜进士及第，苏洵虽未应试却以文章名震天下。朝廷授苏洵试秘书省校书郎，苏洵终于以布衣之身跻身仕途。此年三苏文章风行海内，士子争相仿效其文风。
开封（1060） · 名动京师
宋仁宗嘉祐五年，苏洵受命与姚辟同修《太常因革礼》一百卷，此为朝廷重要的典章制度编纂工程。苏洵虽自谦非礼学专长，但以其深厚的史学功底和严谨的治学态度，承担了大部分修撰工作。
开封（1063） · 晚年修书
宋仁宗嘉祐八年（1063年），苏洵妻程氏卒于眉山，苏轼、苏辙奔丧归蜀。苏洵因修书之任未能亲往，悲痛不已，作祭文以寄哀思。此间苏洵身体渐衰，但仍坚持修撰《太常因革礼》。
开封（1065） · 晚年修书
宋英宗治平二年，《太常因革礼》百卷修成奏上，苏洵以功升为霸州文安县主簿。此职虽品秩不高，但苏洵不以为意，仍致力于文章著述。此年苏洵身体已大不如前，常感疲倦不适。
开封（1066） · 晚年修书
宋英宗治平三年，苏洵病逝于开封，享年五十八岁。苏轼、苏辙扶柩归蜀，葬于眉州彭山安镇乡。欧阳修为其撰墓志铭，朝廷追赠光禄寺丞。苏洵一生虽起步较晚，却以不世之才跻身唐宋八大家之列。
The Life Journey of Su Xun, Who Began at Twenty-Seven
Su Xun (1009-1066), of Meishan, is Chinese education's great argument that it is never too late: a wilful sporting youth who failed every examination, he burned his youthful writings at twenty-seven, shut the door, and read for a decade — then walked into Kaifeng with his two sons and twenty-two essays ('On Power,' 'Balanced Discourses') that Ouyang Xiu put before the emperor. In 1057 both sons passed in the same class. 'Three Sus' — and the father, never a jinshi, entered the Eight Great Masters of Tang-Song prose as a commoner.
Timeline of the Journey
- 1009 · Meishan — Born to a comfortable country family at the Yarn-Hong Row of Meishan: the boy who would not study, rode and roamed and exasperated a county — by common opinion the family's failure.
- 1036 · Meishan — Twenty-seven, another examination failed: the awakening. Everything he had written went into the fire; the door shut; six or seven years of the classics, the historians, the hundred masters — through, at last.
- 1056 · Kaifeng — The journey north with Su Shi and Su Zhe: twenty-two essays presented to Ouyang Xiu, who read, marveled, and sent them to the throne — the capital's scholars copying the Meishan manner overnight.
- 1057 · Kaifeng — Both sons pass in the same examination class: the father, unexamined, now the most famous prose stylist in the empire. The 'Three Su' name made in a single spring.
- 1060 · Kaifeng — Commissioned to co-edit the hundred-chapter 'Rites of the Taichang, Continued' — the dynasty's ritual corpus, most of the work his.
- 1063 · Kaifeng — His wife Lady Cheng dies at Meishan; the sons mourn in Shu, the father kept at the capital by the great book — the grief set into letters he could not deliver in person.
- 1065 · Kaifeng — The hundred chapters complete, honored with a minor registrar's post: rank he never sought, work he never stopped.
- 1066 · Kaifeng — Dead at fifty-eight; the sons carry the coffin home to Meishan. Ouyang Xiu wrote the epitaph; posterity added the seat among the Eight Masters.
'The Six States were ruined, not by war but by bribery' — the essay every schoolchild still meets. Su Xun wasted nothing but his own first twenty-seven years, and made even those into the lesson.
