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The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

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  • The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

    If you have read this book please submit your comments here.

    What is the best way to dissect a book such as this? First provide a summary? Discuss the book chronologically? Focus on plot or characters?

    Let's chew up this book. I tag in Scrivener to start us off.

    pax

  • #2
    Re: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

    There are a lot of ways to approach this, but let's start off with this: What's something you liked about the novel, and what's something you didn't like about it? Try to limit yourself to one (or two) things for each; this way, we can respond to one another clearly.

    Also, Pu`ai, did you cry?
    But I'm disturbed! I'm depressed! I'm inadequate! I GOT IT ALL! (George Costanza)
    GrouchyTeacher.com

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    • #3
      Re: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

      WARNING EVERYONE-- If you haven't figured this out by now: THIS IS A SPOILER THREAD! </Emergency Broadcast System>

      When O-Lan was dying it broke my heart. The very last scene in the book also broke my heart.

      I would like to talk about Wang Lung first.

      Wang Lung: reminded me of my grandfather. He was a hard worker and had great ethic. There were moments when he truly understood that the pivotal turns in his life towards the positive had everything to do with O-Lan. But the irony was that as dim as he regarded her, it was he and not O-Lan who was the dim one. For the most part, he consistently gave her opinions respect. Through his limitations, I found his character most redeeming when he granted her wish to keep two pearls. And for that reason, my opinion of him suffered when he rashly decided that "pearls were for fair women".

      As much as I hurt for him at the end of his life, the very phrase that went through my mind was "his character was his fate". He was a hard worker, but he couldn't discern much. He depended on his wife to make the best decisions (although his to plunk the jewels into land was a wise--if not fateful--one) but never loved her and he let her down. The scene of her dying days and his surge of compassion and grief gave me a glimpse of his humanity at how broken he was to realize what she provided him in his life. Still, I wanted to reach into the book and kick his ass when he dallied in the tea house during the flood, because it was there he chose to pull away from the land--hence, his character determining his fate.

      As long as Wang Lung kept to the land, he lived up to his moral capacity as a good man. When he allowed other elements to preoccupy his time, I thought that this man failed to learn the lesson that the Hwangs provided him: concerning himself with the spoils of wealth and not the nobility of working for it would ultimately bring the downfall of his house.

      I can go on and on. To summarize, it was WL's ignorance and character that overcame his work ethic and common sense.

      What is your opinion of WL? Where did he redeem himself in your eyes? Where did he fail? Did his fairness of character concern you? What failings were you able to overlook, and what of those struck you?

      tagging back out....

      pax

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      • #4
        Re: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

        What is your opinion of WL? Where did he redeem himself in your eyes? Where did he fail? Did his fairness of character concern you? What failings were you able to overlook, and what of those struck you?
        Nice summary of Wang Lung.

        It's been many years since I read this, but I recall thinking he was a normal human being; not evil, but cut down by pride. That's what caused his great fall. It makes me think of the beatitude, "the meek shall inherit the earth."
        * I would be most content if my children grew up to be the kind of people who think decorating consists mostly of building enough bookshelves. *
        - Anna Quindlen

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        • #5
          Re: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

          What is your opinion of WL? Where did he redeem himself in your eyes? Where did he fail? Did his fairness of character concern you? What failings were you able to overlook, and what of those struck you?
          What I love about Wang Lung is that he is flawed, but his strengths make up for those flaws except in realms where his strengths do him little or no good. He knows what to do with the land. He knows how to relate to his neighbors. He does with money, at first, what he knows to do. When the lower rungs on Maslow's Heirarchy of Basic Needs are taken care of, and Wang Lung has not only the means but the TIME to pursue other interests, it is THEN that he is ignorant.

          But his heart is good. He is touched by O-Lan's wanting to keep the pearls. He gives up his portion of the dried beans to feed to his "poor fool." When O-Lan dies, she is buried in the place of honor. And when Ching dies, he is buried as part of the family. He could have done away with Ching, but he understands what drives good men to acts of desperation, and he and Ching both benefit from this friendship.

          So redemption? I guess it is in the deaths of his wife and friend that I see redemption for Wang Lung. No man can be expected to know everything about everything, so I cut him a little bit of slack, especially in this culture where it is his right to take a second and third wife.

          I wonder if our slight differences of opinion are related to our being different genders.

          What do you think was the greatest contributor to Wang Lung's downfall? A question I used to ask my freshmen all the time was: who is most responsible for Wang Lung's success, and who is most responsible for his downfall? I also like to ask them who the most adimirable of the characters is. The teens had interesting takes on it -- what do you think they usually said?
          But I'm disturbed! I'm depressed! I'm inadequate! I GOT IT ALL! (George Costanza)
          GrouchyTeacher.com

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          • #6
            Re: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

            When I read the book, I knew to set aside my awareness of misogyny and women's rights and place myself (as much as possible) into the context of those times and cultural mores. But that having been said, it wasn't that O-lan bore the burdens that she had which made me incredulous at WL's decisions. It was that he had the chance to give O-Lan her due within that society--hire her help, have her honored as the kit fat (Old Mistress) wife and make the 2nd behave subserviently, and yes, let her keep her pearls--but he didn't. Those areas were deepest character flaws to me.

            When they were young and reaped their first harvest into surplus, it was O-Lan who suggested to hide it in the corner of the floor and the wall. WL came with a solid work ethic--he took care of his father all that time by himself, and he knew to regard his wife's words as sage advice--but it was O-Lan who influenced him beyond his scope of experience.

            When the crowd came to steal from their house during the great famine, it was O-Lan who controlled the crowd to steal certain things, thus sparing the lives of their family.

            O-Lan had the skills to pull her family up during the hardest of times. Yes, WL worked as hard as she did, but it was O-Lan's resourcefulness that saw the family through their hardest situations. If anything, WL had the greater heart--he couldn't bear to kill the ox nor sell his poor fool into slavery (which I thought was beautiful) yet his wife was the one who faced crises with practicality and pulled them through.

            I don't begrudge WL for taking a second wife, but it was O-Lan's right to have Lotus wait upon her as the mistress of the house, the mother of WL's many sons and yet it is Lotus who gets the apartment, the fulltime servant in Cuckoo, and the all the sweet meats to eat.

            My sense of fairness comes into play because we see O-Lan die compensated, but ultimately unrewarded.

            pax

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            • #7
              Re: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

              now why I loved Wang Lung:

              through those early years and each time he encountered something new and difficult to negotiate, his kindness was evident.

              He was touched and amazed with his wife's work ethic and considered her good fortune. Although she was a slave and not pretty to look at, he found himself time and again respecting her opinion by following it--something remarkable considering the time and social conditions. Nowhere in the book do we see them argue on any point, and although Buck does not let us glimpse much at O-Lan's reaction to his taking of her pearls, we are reminded later the depth of her hurt when she says to him "and you gave her my pearls!"

              When they were in the city, his tenderness towards his daughter was really touching. When he weighed the practical benefits of selling that daughter to get his family home--which we are reminded of that this goal of his was dear to the point of painful--he could not bear what her reality would have been.

              For all of WL's ethic, what was saddest to me was that he was unable to pass it along to his sons. This is the understandable paradox that we see today: parents, who work their asses off, want to give their children the better advantage than they themselves ever had. And yet to do this is to fail to realize that the sweat from the brow was the very protective factor that forged their spine--something not growing sturdy in their spoiled children.

              Yet I cannot blame WL or O-Lan for this. Those children were old enough to recall life during the famine, when they had to go to the city and beg. Those memories of begging and poverty should have seared into the children's heads and hearts. But we don't see much in the way of these children respecting the very root of their prosperity, the most cherished and revered aspect of their father's life: the land.

              For these children, I hurt for WL. His children ultimately fail him, succumbing to the times and to their immediate desires. At least though, they let him die thinking that his descendants will forever have their land. That kindess cannot be overlooked, even though we can guess what their future inevitably was.

              pax

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              • #8
                Re: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

                To me, the book was about the family and hard work. If you don't do hard work and take care of your family, then life is worthless. But then again, if you push everyone to their limit, then they'll backstab you.
                How'd I get so white and nerdy?

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                • #9
                  Re: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

                  That's interesting, Pu`ai. I never thought of the sons' deceiving their old father as being something of an act of kindness, but I think I agree. Wang Lung earns his fortune doing what he knows how to do, but he makes it possible for his sons to earn theirs pursuing careers of their choosing, effectively using his wealth to increase their own. And as you say, that's what he works so hard for: So that his sons don't have to work as hard.

                  Unfortunately, as you say, the work is part of the deal, right? I know that I am in many ways not as good a person as my parents are because I have not had to work for what I have, while my parents each started with nothing and did what it took to ensure their kids had good educations and could make the kind of choices with their lives that my parents were not quite as free to make.

                  O-Lan is clearly an extraordinary person. Wang Lung marvels at some of the things she does (coming in from the field to bear her child and then going right back out to continue the work), so clearly it is not common for a wife to be so shrewd and industrious.

                  Beyond the sequence of events and the characters who bring this story to life, what did you think of the writing?
                  But I'm disturbed! I'm depressed! I'm inadequate! I GOT IT ALL! (George Costanza)
                  GrouchyTeacher.com

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                  • #10
                    Re: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

                    I thought the writing style was wonderfully simple and modern. What I mean is, I pay attention to the evolution of writing styles through the 19-20th centuries. Buck could have been more Dorothy Parker-esque in her prose, how she constructs a sentence, going off with liberal dosages of writing nuances that today's audience might find archaic, quaint, and a bit distracting. She stuck to a simple prose in everything she describes. Perhaps this is how she understands Chinese to flow? She was bilingual after all, and I find myself enduring similar structures when I meld my English and Hawaiian in sentence construction (meaning, torquing my English because that is how it would be said in Hawaiian and vice versa). Her verse was beautiful and just enough.

                    What about you?

                    pax

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                    • #11
                      Re: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

                      Oh, I totally agree. There is a quiet beauty in her style; I didn't think to tie it to her understanding of Chinese languages, but rather to her subject matter. These are simple people living a simple, ancient life that could be centuries ago or last year (except for the definite historical references). I think Buck's poetry comes in what she describes -- what the characters notice and think -- rather than in any kind of linguistic acrobatics. I appreciate skilled turns of phrases as much as the next reader, but they would have been sorely out of place in a novel about these quiet, simple people.

                      *sigh*

                      I need to read it again. It's been four years, and I used to read it every summer.
                      But I'm disturbed! I'm depressed! I'm inadequate! I GOT IT ALL! (George Costanza)
                      GrouchyTeacher.com

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                      • #12
                        Re: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

                        What little I know about Chinese dialects was reaffirmed in the meter of her prose. What I would like to do is see some of her other works and focus on her writing style. Are you familiar with any of her other books? Could you make a recommendation?

                        pax

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                        • #13
                          Re: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

                          I read a collection of two short stories called The Water Buffalo Children & the Dragon Fish when I was in third grade (did your elementary school have the Hawaii English Program? I read it as part of HEP's Instructional Library), but I don't remember anything about it. A colleague gave me a set of three novels (The Good Earth and two sequels), but I haven't read the sequels yet! I'm so embarrassed. Maybe I'll pick one of them up. I couldn't even tell you what those sequels are called.

                          I will recommend another novel by another author, though. Jacob Have I Loved by Katherine Paterson. Paterson is also the child of missionaries (to Japan, I believe), and has written several books set in Asia. This isn't one of them, but it definitely shares Wang Lung's spirit, and the writing is beautiful. It is a Newbery Medal recipient (one of two for Paterson -- the other was for A Bridge to Terabithia), and one of the best.
                          But I'm disturbed! I'm depressed! I'm inadequate! I GOT IT ALL! (George Costanza)
                          GrouchyTeacher.com

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