"He's a simple man. What you see is what you get." For a poor family like the Wangs, with their captain father "who had no concept of how to seek personal advantage," no great sums were available for the children. There were no highfalutin and expensive hobbies, and, other than text books, few books at all.
像王家這樣清貧的家庭，以及上尉父親「老老實實，一點都不懂得鑽營討巧」的個性，不可能有什麼栽培孩子的大手筆，也不會去培養什麼優雅的嗜好；書是除了正規課本外少有別的選擇。