After the May Fourth Movement in 1919, the vernacular gradually replaced the classical Chinese, and the call for reforming Chinese characters followed. The western trend of thought has also had a huge impact on the research and development of calligraphy art and calligraphy theory. Lu-Xun, Qian-Xuantong, Cai-Yuanpei, Li-Jinxi, Zhao-Yuanren etc., all participated in the reform of writing. At that time, Yu-Youren, the leader of the calligraphy circle, also sensed this trend. Without any hesitation, he gave up the great form of the peak period of Xingkai reached in the early 1930s; he began to carry out the reform of cursive script for 33 years, and thoroughly implemented the "save the nation through promoting cursive script" ideal.

From the initial reform of the chapter "Ji Jiu Zhang (hurriedly-written essay)” to the selection of "Standard Cursive Script Thousand Characters" as an intermediary for the promotion of cursive script， to reach the purpose of “Love Day light and Save Time" ; he personally presided over nine revisions, except for the first revision of the inscription entitled “Standard Cursive Script Model Thousand Characters". The subsequent revisions are all entitled "Standard Cursive Script", and that’s why this article is now also titled accordingly.

This article is divided into four directions: First, it takes the six drafting kinds of "Standard Cursive Script" in the early reform period of Yu-Youren's cursive script, all entitled as “cursive script thousand-character (anthology)” , to discuss the phased influence to later compilation of the "Standard Cursive Script Model Thousand-Character Anthology" completed between about 1935 and July 1936. The improvement process before the completion is the key interest here; the second is to discuss the characteristics and publication time of each earlier revision, especially for the first revisions that laid the foundation for the reform; the third is to focus on the analysis of special and doubtful editions; the fourth is to test the authenticity of the "Jinling Jiuluotang Edition", which is the most frequently published and the most widely disseminated in mainland China, and the "Jiyunbao Thousand-character Anthology" signed by Yu-Youren.