Good Earth, The ~ Pearl Buck ~ September Book Club Online

[JoanP]

The Book Club Online is  the oldest  book club on the Internet, begun in 1996, open to everyone.  We offer cordial discussions of one book a month,  24/7 and  enjoy the company of readers from all over the world.  Everyone is welcome.

September Book Club Online 
 

The Good Earth by Pearl Buck

Interest in Pearl Buck's  The Good Earth, continues with the news that her never-before published, final novel is coming out in October, forty years after her death.  The Good Earth is the poignant tale of a farmer and his family in old agrarian China, a  depiction of traditional Chinese culture in the early twentieth century before World War II.  Some critics say it should move readers to rediscover Buck as a source of insight into both revolutionary China and the United States’ interactions with it. Let's discover together why The Good Earth remained on the bestseller list for 21 months in 1931 and 1932, and was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1932.l Relevant Links: the Good Earth Timeline ; Comprehensive Bio of Pearl Buck and her work ;

DISCUSSION SCHEDULE:
September 2-8	Chapters 1-8
September 9-15	Chapters 9-15
September 16-20	Chapters 16-21
September 21-25	Chapters 22-28
September 26-29	Chapters 29-34

Some Topics for Discussion
Sept. 21-25 ~ Chapters 22-28

1.  Pearl Buck writes that  Lotus is a symbol.  Of what?  Is the entire book a sort of allegory, Wang Lung and his family's struggles symbolic of life in China during this period?

2.  O-lan suggested slaves for restless older son -as provided for the young lords in the big house.  Is there a moral here, a lesson to be learned?   Will Wang Learn it in time?

3.  Have you noticed when Wang Lung is prosperous, he forgets the two earth gods?    Is that why he depends on his uncle's protection?

4.  "There is a fire in my vitals."  O-lan says this on several occasions.  Did anyone ever listen to her?  Do you sense her isolation?
   
5.  O-lan  might have been able to handle Lotus' presence if it hadn't been for Cuckoo being there too.  What does this say about Cuckoo's role in the tale?

6. O-lan now feels  she is "hideous" to her  husband.  Was that true from the beginning? Her feet, too big, never bound.  Do you think she will bind the feet of the little girl twin?

7. Always good news when the rains come, or the flood waters recede and the earth produces.   Elder son pregnant with first grandchild - a boy! (how do they know this in advance?)

8. No peace in the house.  What led to Wang Lung's decision to move the family into the big house of Hwang in town?  Why is this a significaant move?
 

Contact:  JoanP 

[bellamarie]

In The Exile, Carie lives in China as Andrew's wife and the mother of her remaining children (Edwin, Comfort/Pearl, and Faith and Precious Cloud whom she adopted).  The reason it is called the Exile is because Carie always longed to live back home in America, yet felt she must not deny Andrew his calling to be a missionary in China, because she felt Andrew was much more a better person/Christian than she. She never saw herself as good as Andrew when it came to her relationship with God. (Although I personally disagreed) Carie is everything you described above Annie.  She was a loyal wife, a loving mother to her children, a teacher, a healer, she helped everyone she could, she struggled with her personal relationship with God, always waiting and wanting Him to give her a sign.  I loved Carie in The Exile, and all those in the book did too.  Pearl's middle name is Comfort because it is said she brought comfort to Carie especially after losing her babies to illnesses.  Carie suffered many illnesses herself and went through bouts of depression after losing her babies.  She got angry with God, yet she never turned from Him.  I have dropped some "nuggets" as JoanP. hoped for throughout my postings while reading The Exile, you'll have to skim back through.  After I finished the book, I just sat and wanted more.  Pearl did an excellent job in writing the book and I am finding I liked The Exile much more than The Good Earth, even though she won her Pulitzer Prize for Good Earth.

I feel as though I know Cari, the mother so much more than Pearl.  In The Good Earth I am not seeing Pearl in any of the women so far unless it was the American lady, Lung gave a ride to.  O-lan is nothing like Carie or Pearl in my own opinion.

Ciao for now~

[Dana]

There's a great PSB book which deals with the place of the concubine in Chinese society, " The Womans' Pavilion",  another about the empress Tsu Hsi as she calls her, "The Last Empress" and another interesting one about the Jews in China--"Peony"
All fascinating.
I have a pile of her other books I haven't got to yet, I love her style of writing and her admiration of the society, or aspects of it anyway.

[JoanP]

Fascinating, isn't it?  I'd never thought of a concubine as a wife either - until reading some of the sources you are providing.
I looked up the word "concubine" itself, thinking there would be a clue - From the latin: con = with and cubare, to lie down  That doesn't sound as if there is anything legally binding, does it?  A rather casual arrangement.  But when the man who has lain with the prostitute takes her home with him, that's a different story.
This link Annie provided earlier seems to point to the fact that Lotus can be considered the "second wife."

"I don't see Lotus as Lung's wife.  They did not take vows."

 Bella, you got me thinking about Wang Lung and O-lan's marriage just now.  Were there vows exchanged?  Does the fact that the old Lord in the big house gave his slave to Olan constitute a marriage?  Or the fact that the two of them went to before the two small earth gods and lit the incense sticks on the way home?
I'm trying to see where O-lan more Wang Lung's wife than Lotus...except for the fact that O-lan bore him sons.  What if Lotus gets pregnant?  Does this make her Wang Lung's wife - second wife?  (DId you think it strange that she has not had a child?)

Dana - can you tell if Peony is one of the girls in the House of Flowers?  I thought maybe the flower name was an indication...  Never thought of the Jews in China...until now.

Wasn't that a low moment - when Wang Lung took the two white pearls from O-lan?  Why?  He's given so much to Lotus - does he intend to give those to her as well?

Jude - I found something more on the Presbyterian missionaries that might interest you.  Will go try to find that link.

[JoanP]

Here's the link with information on the missionaries in China - and Pearl's father from a book by Hilary Spirling - Several of you have mentioned this book...  it's a long fascinating article, I'll pull out some of the missionary information...

Pearl Buck in China (Missionaries)  

Caroline Sydenstricker had set sail for the Orient as an idealistic young bride with only the haziest notion about what a missionary career might entail. For her it turned out in practice to mean housekeeping and child rearing in cramped, inconvenient lodgings in the poorer quarters of the more or less hostile cities where her husband parked his growing family, while he himself pushed forward into unknown territory in search of fresh converts. He drove himself on by totting up the staggering totals of heathen sinners to be saved and the pitifully thin line of men like himself standing between them and damnation, an insoluble equation that appalled and maddened him to the end of his life. When the Sydenstrickers first landed in Shanghai to join the Southern Presbyterian Mission in the autumn of 1880, they brought its numbers in the field up to twelve. Apart from a handful of foreign compounds in or near the main trading ports, the interior of China seemed to be theirs for the taking. Seven years later Absalom Sydenstricker persuaded the Mission Board to let him launch a personal assault on the vast, densely populated area of North kiangsu, setting up his campaign headquarters in the walled city of Tsingkiangpu, nearly three hundred miles north of Shanghai on the Grand Canal, where no missionary had ever settled before. “He had to himself an area as large as the state of Texas, full of souls who had never heard the Gospel,” his daughter wrote later. “He was intoxicated with the magnificence of his opportunity.” The local people received him with passive and often active resistance. A younger colleague eventually dispatched to join him boasted that for three years he made not a single convert, coming home from country trips with spit on his clothes and bruises all over his body from sticks and stones hurled as he passed. Almost overwhelmed by the numerical odds stacked against him, Absalom spent more and more time on the road.

Absalom remained as always incredulous at his wife’s inability to put the crying need of a whole nation of infidels before her own private setbacks. “I never saw so hard a heart, so unreasoning a mind as hers in those days,” he said, looking back gloomily twenty years later. “Nothing I could say would move her.”

But the immediate problem confronting Absalom on his return to Tsingkiangpu in January 1893 was not so much heathen obstinacy as the intransigence of his fellow missionaries. The younger man who had arrived as an assistant twelve months before the Sydenstrickers left was not only living in their house but had stored their possessions in an outbuilding, where Absalom found his books mildewed and his bookcases eaten by termites. In the two years of his absence his system had been overhauled and Rev. James Graham, the colleague now starting to look more like a usurper, had pointed out its shortcomings to the mission meeting, which voted diplomatically to let Sydenstricker go. Interpreting this outcome as a triumphant endorsement of his vocation as a “Gospel herald,” Absalom repossessed the house, settled his family back into it, and promptly set off with two new recruits by mule cart to stake out a fresh claim of his own in virgin territory seventy-five miles to the west. His new base of Hsuchien was a collection of straw-roofed mud houses on the edge of the immense, crowded, and poverty-stricken flood plain of the Yellow River, where he aimed to establish a network of small outstations within reach of his own post at the center, while incidentally putting as much space as possible between himself and the mission authorities, always far too ready to query his decisions in favor of crackpot schemes of their own.   

Her analysis of Carie’s predicament in The Exile and elsewhere is searching, frank, and perceptive. But it is in the daughter’s fiction that the mother’s voice echoes most insistently between the lines, at times muted, plaintive, and resigned, at others angry and vengeful

Golly, this is so long - and only part of the excerpt from Chapter I in Hilary Spirling's book.  Who is this woman?  How does she know so many intimate details of Pearl Buck's life?  Does anyone know?

[PatH]

O-lan is nothing like Carie or Pearl in my own opinion.

Ciao for now~

in my opinion too.

[bellamarie]

JoanP, "you got me thinking about Wang Lung and O-lan's marriage just now.  Were there vows exchanged?  Does the fact that the old Lord in the big house gave his slave to Olan constitute a marriage?  Or the fact that the two of them went  before the two small earth gods and lit the incense sticks on the way home?
I'm trying to see where O-lan is more Wang Lung's wife than Lotus...except for the fact that O-lan bore him sons.  What if Lotus gets pregnant?  Does this make her Wang Lung's wife - second wife?  (DId you think it strange that she has not had a child?)

Actually the rites they took in front of the two Gods were their matrimonial vows from what I understood.  Lung did not at any time, so far take any vows with Lotus.  She is his concubine and according to the definition I supplied, a concubine can not lawfully become a legal wife.  Pearl was specific in the first chapters when she points out O-lan is his wife.  Pearl did not use any word other than "wife."  
Regarding children from a concubine this is from my prior post: "Concerning the concubine's legal status or the legal definition of her status, in ancient China for example, concubinage was akin, although inferior, to marriage. The children of a concubine were recognized as legal offspring of the father. However, their inheritance rights may have been inferior to younger children of a marriage, or they may have received a smaller inheritance."

I sense Lotus and Cuckoo will fly the coop!  

I was mortified when Lung asked for the pearls from O-lan so he could give them to Lotus.  Then when O-lan realized Lotus had her pearls that just made tears well up in my eyes.

[JudeS]

I agree that O-Lan is not like Pearl or Carrie.
She is a correct portrayal of an uneducated but good -hearted peasant woman. She suffered much and expects very little
in return for all her efforts. She is not a complex personality like her author or the author's mother.
The latter two are people with many aspirations for themselves and their progeny.

Joan P -Thank you so much for adding to the further reality of the Missionary life in China.
 Nothing is simple. Certainly not the life of the Buck family.

[JoanP]

I think nothing is clear-cut when attempting to understand another culture from the outside.  It's fortunate that we have so many of Pearl Buck's novels to help.   And the Internet.  Bella, I  am not sure if you read the link Annie put up yesterday...gives something to think about regarding second-wife status in China.   
http://shardsofchina.wordpress.com/2012/01/30/sex-in-china-the-second-wife-or-er-nai/

Why do you feel Lotus and Cuckoo are going to leave?  They've got an easy life with Wang Lung...besides where would they go?  It would sure make O-lan happy if they left.

[bellamarie]

Here is an article of concubines in the days of The Good Earth.
http://www.beijingmadeeasy.com/beijing-history/concubines-of-ancient-china

Annie's link pertained to second wives and er-nai, which were modern day after 1971.

Pearl has not indicated Wang Lung and Lotus were ever married.  He refers to her as his mistress, and the father calls her a harlot, and when he does say to her "she a farmer's wife," she denounces it.

pg. 152  Then he was angry beyond bearing and he seized O-lan’s shoulder and he shook her soundly and said, “Do not be yet more of a fool. It is not for the servant but for the mistress.”

Pg. 155  Then when the old man saw his son standing beside a slender painted girl he cried out in his shrill cracked voice, “There is a harlot in the house!” and he would not be silent…….”Now calm your heart, my father.  It is not a harlot but a second woman in the house.”  But the old man would not be silent and whether he heard what was said or not no one knew only he shouted over and over, “There is a harlot here!”  And he said suddenly, seeing Wang Lung near him, “And I had one woman and my father had one woman and we farmed the land.”  And again he cried out after a time, “I say it is a harlot!”  And so the old man woke from his aged and fitful sleeping with a sort of cunning hatred against Lotus

Pg 158 (Lung)  But he laughed and he seized her small, curling hands in his soiled ones and he laughed again and said,  “Now you see that your lord is but a farmer and you a farmer’s wife!” “A farmer’s wife am I not, be you what you like!”  

As for the reason I see Lotus and Cuckoo leaving, these paragraphs of the chapters show Lung is no longer happy with Lotus, no longer infatuated or in love with her.  It also shows she is no longer happy with him, and she has so far not been able to give him a son, which he states when she called "poor little" an idiot.

pg. 153 But after all this matter of the new kitchen became a thorn in his body, for Cuckoo went to the town every day and she bought this and that of expensive foods that are imported from the southern citites….And these cost money more than he liked to give out, but still not so much, he was sure, as Cuckoo told him, and yet he was afraid to say, “You are eating my flesh,” for fear she would be offended and angry at him, and it would displease Lotus, and so there was nothing he could do except to put his hand unwilling to his girdle.  And this was a thorn to him day after day, and because there was none to whom he could complain of it, the thorn pierced more deeply continually, and it cooled a little of the fire of love in him for Lotus.

pg. 154   And so his love for Lotus was not whole and perfect as it had been before, absorbing utterly his mind and body.  It was pierced through and through with small angers which were the more sharp because they must be endured because he could no longer go even to O-lan freely for speech, seeing now their life was sundred.

pg.  157   Wang Lung woke as from a sleep.  He went to the door of his house and he looked over his fields.  And he saw that the waters had receded and the land lay shining under the dry cold wind and under the ardent sun.  Then a voice cried out in him, a voice deeper than love cried out in him for his land.  And he heard it above every other voice in his life and he tore off the long robe he wore and he stripped off his velvet shoes and his white stockings and he rolled his trousers to his knees and he stood forth robust and eager and he shouted, “Where is the hoe and where the plow?  And where is the seed for the wheat planting?  Come, Ching, my friend_ come_ call the men_I go out to the land!”  As he had been healed of his sickness of heart when he came from the southern city and comforted by the bitterness he had endured there, so now again Wang Lung was healed of his sickness of love by the good dark earth of his fields and he felt the moist soil on his fee and he smelled the earthy fragrance rising up out of the furrows he turned for the wheat.


So now my curiosity has peaked with wonder as to what is allowed if a man purchases a concubine, and no longer wants her, or she no longer wants to be there?  Can she and Cuckoo sneak off into the night to be free of him?  I haven't read ahead but I sure am anxious to see where Pearl is taking us in the next assigned chapters.  Will the two women rob him of his money/jewels and go to another part of China to live and start their prostitution yet again?  Can't wait.......

Eyes are getting sleepy, have to get up early in the morning, so I will bid you all a Good Night.....zzzzzzzz

Ciao for now~

[kidsal]

Pearl S Buck, A Cultural Biography by Peter Conn, 1996

1   Founded Welcome House, the first international, interracial adoption agency in the US; founded the East and West Foundation to promote education exchange; established a foundation in her name to provide medical care and education for over 25,000 Amerasian children in a dozen Asian countries,
2   Awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, a Pulitzer, Howells Medal
3   Married Lossing Buck, Richard Walsh.  Affair with Hsu Chih-mo a Chinese poet (died in a plane crash in 1931).
4   Spoke out about internment of Japanese Americans, led National campaign to repeal Chinese exclusion laws, active in the civil-rights movement, served on Board of Urban League, promoted modern birth control and Equal Rights Amendment.
5   Target of McCarthyism
6   Herbert Hoover kept an FBI file on Pearl Buck (over 300 pages, a portion remains classified).
7   Friends/adversaries:  Sinclair Lewis, Margaret Mead, Chiang Kai-shek and Mme Chaing, Theodore Dreiser, Margaret Sanger, Eleanor Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, Will Rogers, Charles Lindberg, Rose Kennedy, John Kennedy, Oscar Hammerstein II, Indira Gandhi, Henry Luce, etc.

[salan]

I think Lotus is getting older & perhaps would not find it as easy to become someone else's concubine.  Cuckoo is sly and cunning.  She will probably find someone else to latch onto once Lotus is no longer useful. 
Sally

[JoanP]

Good morning, early birds!

Kidsal, it's hard to believe that this young mother's solitary writing in isolated China led to such a presence on the world stage doesn't it?  Mind-boggling!  Sometimes I forget young Janice, the daughter she adopted in New York in 1925... playing at her feet.  Janice would be about five when Pearl was writing this story we are reading.  Don't you wonder what her childhood must have been like?  I'd love to read any memories that she had growing up in China!

[JoanP]

It seems that when the earth is productive, Wang Lung is the farmer, his old self.  It's when there's draught, flood and famine we see a man we don't want to see - a man we don't like - or recognize.  That's when he started to visit the teahouse, met Lotus...and brought "the harlot" into the house.  Through it all, Olan is with him - the faithful wife, mother of his children, even with Lotus in their midst.  Maybe the book should be called The Good Wife?

She  might have been able to handle Lotus presence if it hadn't been for Cuckoo being there too.  As soon as she appeared, and you realized she was Olan's  superior in the big house, didn't you just know there would be trouble? We"ll have to read on to see how she'll handle the situation if Lotus no longer charms the master of the house, Sally.. I agree, she is cunning - and already has too much influence over Wang Lung.  I don't want to think about where this is going.  Do you see a happy ending?

It will be interesting to see what happens  as Wang Lung loses interest in Lotus. Bella sees Cuckoo robbing him and running off with Lotus to start again.  I think she's too cunning for that - and the bloom is off the lotus blossom. But I don't think Lung will ever be satisfied with Olan as a wife again.  She is now " hideous" to him, compared to Lotus.  Her feet are too big for one thing.  Do you think Olan will actually bind the feet of the little girl twin?

[bellamarie]

Hello Kidsal, it's nice to see you.  I found this interesting in your post.  "6. Herbert Hoover kept an FBI file on Pearl Buck (over 300 pages, a portion remains classified)."

In my timeline of Pearl, I posted earlier I found this also interesting:

(1914 – 1933)  She served as a Presbyterian missionary, but her views became highly controversial during the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy, leading to her resignation.
    
During the Cultural Revolution, Buck, as a preeminent American writer of Chinese village life, was denounced as an "American cultural imperialist."[citation needed] Buck was "heartbroken" when she was prevented from visiting China with Richard Nixon in 1972.

I can't imagine what they have in those files that would still remain classified.  Is it possible Pearl was more active in politics than we know?  Did her time and activities in China, along with the books she wrote on China cast suspicion on her in a political sense? And imagine seeing Lindberg on the list of friends/adversaries!  Why would Pearl be prevented from going to China in 1972?  This rouses my interest to know more about Pearl.

JoanP, I don't think Lung ever truly was "in" love with O-lan, so I think their marriage will go back to being the same as before, only he may never sleep with O-lan in a marital act again.  He is a man of the land and now that he has "sowed his oats with Lotus," he is ready to sow his land of many seeds, and that is where his true love is. O-lan is a smart woman, she was not looking for romance and love, I think she is happy just to be married, have children and live comfortably with her husband and family.  Now as for Lotus, she is not a woman I can see laying around waiting for a dirty, garlic smelling farmer to return to her after digging in the fields all day.  She is repulsed by the mere fact of Lung calling her "a farmer's wife."  No, I see Lotus and Cuckoo flying the nest, before her beauty fades.  Lotus's blossom had been plucked way before Lung came along.  So, Sally you see Cuckoo leaving Lotus behind.  I don't know why I see them together in robbing Lung, and sneaking off in the night.  Maybe it's the author in me........lololol  

Ciao for now~

[JoanP]

Bella, I think the clue to the Hoover files comes in the item right before that one -

5   Target of McCarthyism  (communism!)  Lindbergh had the same problem...that put him on the public enemies list.
6   Herbert Hoover kept an FBI file on Pearl Buck (over 300 pages, a portion remains classified).  There are tons of these files still classified.

We will have to wait and see if Wang Lung's desire for Lotus cools - after she has indicated her feelings for his children - for his  poor little daughter especially.  He really is attached to that one!  Lotus is still beautiful to him - and desirable.  He is still a man.  We'll see.

[JudeS]

How boring would the story be without Lotus and her machinations?

Half the drama in the story comes from the invisible but oh so real pull between these two women.

To think of Lotus as a  prostitute is to treat the author and the Chinese culture as simplistic.


Last night I watched the PBS "Story of Queen Victoria". Among other fascinating facts was that the British officers all had
local woman ,know as "Bibis" who had their own house and kept their half white, half Indian children with them. These homes were quite opulent and were known as Bibighars.
Different times and different customs.

[bellamarie]

I know when in Rome do as the Romans do, apply to these Chinese customs of concubines, second wives, mistresses, prostitutes, or er-nai may seem simplistic, but....since I am appalled at Wang Lung and Lotus's behavior I refuse to see her as anything but as the links state, secondary.  I personally am not so interested in Lotus or Cuckoo's characters in these chapters as much as I am interested in Lung's change in behavior, actions, thoughts and values.  His mistreatment of O-lan, and how having a mistress or what ever we want to refer to her as, has turned him into a person I do not like.  Lotus is who she is, a prostitute that was being paid for her services in the Tea House.  She knows what she is and is now demanding to be treated like royalty for sex.  In the articles I have read, concubines did not have that position she is having in this story.  They were just objects to be used for the pure pleasure of the man who bought her, when and where he chose to come to her.  To make her more important than this is a mis character in my opinion.  It shows that even though Lung may have the wealth to purchase and enjoy a mistress, he does NOT have the status that most of the Royalty/wealthy had in keeping their concubine in her rightful place.  Which is to demand nothing and be there at the man's beck and call-girl.  Ooops....a little of Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman just slipped out.

Lotus and Cuckoo see how Lung can easily be manipulated because of his lack of knowledge and status when it comes to what to expect from purchasing this mistress.  Other men who would have knowledge of how he is allowing these to women to spend his money, demand the expensive food, jewels etc. would be laughing at him for being taken advantage of by these two harlots.  He keeps allowing his shame to seep in and so he continues on allowing himself to be manipulated, and the sad part is, even O-lan can see how he is allowing his sexual desires to cause him to act like a fool.  She knows other concubines would not get away with these actions. The articles state the wife sets the tone on how the concubine is treated.  That is not the case in this story which goes against the customs.  So Pearl has decided to deviate from the customs and make Lung out to be a fool, rather than a man of respect with a mistress, and to abuse O-lan, his wife who is suppose to hold the highest esteem in this situation.  Its kind of like, you can put lipstick on a pig, but its still a pig!  Or even the Emperor's New Clothes, he is exposed for who he really is no matter how many robes, stockings and shoes he puts on.

Ciao for now~

 

[ANNIE]

I just spent an hour finding what I am quoting from the biography by Spirling (who presents a long bibliography for the book).  I was looking for this because it does help us understand Pearl's reason for  writing the trilogy.  "I conceived the idea of a series of novels, each of which should reveal some fundamental aspect of Chinese life."

So does that statement cause us to look at the The Good Earth differently?  That it presents a part of Chinese life,-- the struggles of the poor and the handling of monies and land by newly rich farmers??

As I was reading last night, I noticed that this book IMHO, has a sing-song tone to the way it presents the story.   Each of the trilogy and her other novels had a reason behind the writing.  

Another point that I found in the bio is this quote from Pearl about her narration of her books.  First, I found that Carie didn't die until 1923 and Pearl wasn't with her.  Just Janice and Absolom.  

With frustration and anger in her heart,  she wrote "The Exile" right after Carie's death.  Pearl says of the book, it was narrated by "a woman I had created out of myself".  When they published the book in 1936, she added to the ending, 13 years after she had written the book.

[ANNIE]

We are leaving town tomorrow and won't be home until Monday night, so I will be missing some of this most interesting discussion.  I will try to look in but don't think I will have time to read  or comment.
PatH, how did the whale watching go?  We did that, going out from Long Beach, back in the 1980's and enjoyed the day immensely. I hope you and Joan did also.

Do you also have a copy of Spirling's bio of PB?  Isn't it interesting?  I am enjoying it.

[bellamarie]

Annie,  "Another point that I found in the bio is this quote from Pearl about her narration of her books.  First, I found that Carie didn't die until 1923 and Pearl wasn't with her.  Just Janice and Absolom."  

I am totally confused with this statement, because in The Exile, Pearl returns to China and is with her when she dies. How can she contradict herself?  Which is true, her accounts in The Exile or the statement from the bio Annie is reading?

Annie, "With frustration and anger in her heart,  she wrote "The Exile" right after Carie's death.  Pearl says of the book, it was narrated by "a woman I had created out of myself".  When they published the book in 1936, she added to the ending, 13 years after she had written the book."

Again, I am confused, because when I searched every site possible I kept reading the author is unknown, possibly a woman Carie knew. It is a bit frustrating to find contradictions from the author.  All through the book I kept feeling as if the narrator was Pearl, but never did she reveal who the narrator was.

Annie thank you for the info you are supplying from this bio.  Who is the person who wrote the bio, is it Pearl herself or was it someone interviewing her?  Why would there be discrepancies if indeed it is Pearl writing this bio, considering she is also the author of The Exile.  Nothing frustrates me more than to find inconsistencies from an author.  Why with frustration and anger in her heart?  No where did I feel her frustration or anger as the writer or the daughter.  I am completely confused, it's like we are not talking about the same book or person.  I've got some research to do to answer some questions, but then how do I trust what I am reading if these two writings of Pearl have inconsistencies?      

Enjoy your time away Annie.  I will be using the week end to read the next chapters, I hope they are better than these last ones.

Ciao for now~

[PatH]

PatH, how did the whale watching go?  We did that, going out from Long Beach, back in the 1980's and enjoyed the day immensely. I hope you and Joan did also.

That's what we did.  We had a wonderful time.  Didn't see any blue  whales, just the spouting from one, but we saw a mother and calf fin whale, the next biggest species, surfacing repeatedly, swimming around each other.  Also a lot of dolfins leaping about,one of them jumping very high out of the water.  There were plenty of birds, to satisfy that side of us.  JoanK saw two new ones: a pink-footed shearwater and a red necked phalarope.  Plus a heap of sea lions lolling on the big base of a buoy, bellowing at us.  The journey out was quite rough, but neither of us is prone to seasickness.

[JoanP]

Oh Pat...that sounds like a fantastic trip - even more so because it was shared with your sister - a twin, at that!  You will have that memory for the rest of your lives!  Happy birthday, again!

Bellamarie, your confusion is understandable.  It has been clear that you loved The Exile and Pearl's mother Carie as portrayed in this "biography"...You seem to be considering The Exile as fact, as you would another biography...but maybe in this case, we need to remember that Pearl Buck was a writer of fiction.
I haven't read Hilary Spirling's book - but have quoted extensively from it.  She included so much factual information about Pearl Buck and direct quotes too -- not available anywhere else.  It's as if she spent a lot of time with Pearl - or maybe with Janice Walsh, the first adopted daughter who lived with Pearl in China.  I would like to learn more about Hilary Spirling herself - and her research for this book, wouldn't you?  I also think, since you have so many questions about the content of The Exile now, you ought to add yet another book to your pile - and read the Spirling book, "Pearl Buck in China" (a link) yourself.   Don't shoot me!

[JoanP]

"How boring would the story be without Lotus and her machinations?"  

 Oh,  I agree, Jude - but my attention really focuses on Cuckoo.  Lotus just seems to be a painted doll - a puppet, with sly and crafty Cuckoo pulling all the strings...

Pearl Buck writes in this section that Lotus is a symbol.   I forget in what sense she meant this.   Does anyone remember?   Is the entire book a sort of allegory with Wang Lung and his family's struggles symbolic of life in China during this period?  If so, what part does Lotus play?  Can't wait to hear what you all think after reading these next chapters!

[ginny]

Yes, I totally think so and have thought so as I've read thru the posts here. I think you've all made this discussion a treasure. I've never seen a better one. I'm not reading the book (I read it again this summer) and I've never seen such depth.  It's truly a joy.


I don't know why I persist in thinking that Wang Lung and the other characters are symbols of various elements of China. I've never seen anything to back that up, I've never seen anything at all to indicate that, but for some reason that's what I keep thinking. Sort of a mini China or Chinese history laid out in allegory.  I didn't think anybody seemed to think so but me. hahahaa

 But now info comes in the form of a quote in this discussion from Pearl Buck herself that that MAY be in fact what she intended! Electric shock!

Linguistically I love her phraseology:" And"...her starting the sentences with and is marvelous. I have to wonder if that's the way the Chinese really translates.  Again no idea.  "And he said suddenly, seeing Wang Lung near him, “And I had one woman and my father had one woman and we farmed the land.”  And again he cried out after a time, “I say it is a harlot!”  And so the old man woke from his aged and fitful sleeping with a sort of cunning hatred against Lotus."

That discussion is a real service, an education. If you can't read along, or are too busy to participate, you can still get a ton of stuff out of it, the research alone is spectacular (I did love bluebird's page of photos, had never seen them before), and you can learn something from it.

I do have the Spurling, if I can find it. This makes me want to read the two sequels, they, also, to me, are allegorical. Particularly about how hard a parent might work to achieve something and what the children make of it. Are they, in fact, following more the sins of the father? It's fascinating. I don't know if they are even in print, it's been a long long time since I read them.

I grew up initially in Bucks County, PA, not all that far from Pearl Buck's home, and never once visited it. I think I need to remedy that.

THIS is a masterpiece of a discussion, pat yourselves, each of you, on the back!

[bellamarie]

JoanP, I agree, I will have to read Spirling's book.  But I need to point out that the inconsistencies I pointed out do not come from The Exile.   They come from sites I listed in my prior posts when I googled Pearl S. Buck.  So while you are correct, I do love The Exile and Carie, I am not basing my frustration on my feelings for them.

If you will browse back through my posts I provided the link on the Timeline of Pearl and it states, she returned to China and cared for her emaciated mother to her death.  A contradiction to Spirling stating, Pearl was not present in China and not with her mother when she died.

As for who is the narrator, again, I researched site after site trying to find something that would give me a clue or definitive answer to my query and all I could find is "unknown, possibly a woman Carie knew."  I am not disputing any of Spirling's information, I am only expressing my frustration with the inconsistencies.  Have I erred with understanding The Exile is NOT a biography, when in fact it is listed as one? 

JoanP., "She included so much factual information about Pearl Buck and direct quotes too -- not available anywhere else. "

Indeed not available anywhere else, and so this is why I asked who is Spirling, and why does her facts contradict the many research sites I have found in regards to Pearl and what is written in The Exile by Pearl?  Why would Pearl have she was with her mother during her last days, caring for her and even quoting her last words, if in fact she was not at all there?  Is that fiction?

JoanP.  " I would like to learn more about Hilary Spirling herself - and her research for this book, wouldn't you?"

Absolutely, I would like to learn more.

No fear of any shootings JoanP., while I admit I have a passionate Italian personality, I am a very gentle woman, and own NO guns.  LOLOL           

Ginny, Hello, my pizan!  I am so happy to see you join us. " I grew up initially in Bucks County, PA, not all that far from Pearl Buck's home, and never once visited it. I think I need to remedy that."

Oh my, you MUST go and visit Pearl's home, and then share with the group!! 

I must get to reading the next chapters, can't wait to see where we are going next.  I began Pride & Prejudice to get warmed up for Oct.'s discussion of Persuasion, and am enjoying Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy so much so, that I am laughing out loud!!

Ciao for now~

[JoanP]

don't know why I persist in thinking that Wang Lung and the other characters are symbols of various elements of China. I've never seen anything to back that up, I've never seen anything at all to indicate that, but for some reason that's what I keep thinking.  Ginny

Thanks for coming in with that, Ginny!  Perfect timing.  I have sensed the same thing - on and off, since the beginning.  We're been hunting down the little clues for just such a connection all along.  Most recently when the Wang family was in the south and the city was overtaken by an army and the poor were left with nothing.  

In the section we are reading now, Pearl Buck concentrates on Lotus - and refers to her as a symbol.  Perhaps that's a hint, a clue that the entire story is an allegory.  Does anyone see Wang Lung in this way?  Does he represent more than just one fortunate farmer in China?

[Jonathan]

Wang Lung as an allegorical figure? Not on your life. With his concubine Wang moves up in the world, reflecting his wealth and his leisure time. Perhaps the author wants us to see a moral in her story, but she is still telling it the way it was. Another of her wonderful books is My Several Worlds, in which she has this to say:

'How can I ever forget the trials of old Mr. Hsu, our town's rich man, whose life was enlivened and beset by his four wives, and the clamor with which they surrounded him! When he travelled on the train to Pengp'u he dared not do what he wished, which was to take only his youngest and therefore his favorite concubine with him. She was a pretty woman in her late twenties, the only one still slender enough to wear the long, tight and very fashionable Shanghai dress. Each journey he began with the determination that he would take only the youngest woman with him, but he was never  allowed the luxury. It was impossible to keep anything secret, and so each woman complained until he was unwillingly agreed to take all four. For economy's sake, however, he distributed them through the train, the third and the youngest concubine with him in second class, the second in third class and his wife and the first concubine in fourth class. Alas, he still had no peace, for the three who were in the lower classed were continually around him, demanding the same food and tidbits that he bought for his favorite. The harassment of Mr Hsu made town talk, embellished with local witticisms.'

Try convincing Wang Lung that it's an allegory. More likely it wil eventually seem like a bad dream.

[Jonathan]

The more one reads about Pearl Buck the more interesting it gets. Towards the end of her life she took on the airs of the old Dowager Empress of China, of great fame. Fact and fiction ran together to make a good story. And her own life, it seems, was a curious combination. The best biographer would have a problem with sorting the one from the other. I've really enjoyed several of Hilary Spurling's bios.  Paul Scott, of Jewel in the Crown fame, and The Life of I. Compton-Burnett. And everyone thinks very highly of her two volumes on Henri Matisse, the painter.

[Jonathan]

It was brilliant to leave it to the reader to wonder about O-lan's feelings and thinking. Never a word from her. But the jewels say it all. She dreamed of another life.

[Dana]

I've just started A House Divided, the third book.  I don't think they're allegories.  In the introduction by PSB to the second book Sons, she says "Sons of-course is a purely Chinese book.  It is totally modelled on the plan of the orthodox Chinese novel. The material is altogether Chinese and the characters are less like ourselves than in The Good Earth." She says she is writing in the style of the Chinese novel of the time, and the second book is most true to the common themes and style, but they all are how Chinese books were.  I agree with Jonathan, she is telling it the way it is.  Only, to my taste in book 1, Olan is a bit too perfect to be realistic.  Everyone else is perfectly realistic and everyone in the other books is too, except the Tiger's lover in book 2 who's another superwoman  (of a different type!),and, essentially, one woman in each book.  Actually I think a weakness in her writings that I have read so far is to have a more or less unrealistic heroine.  Although all the other women are perfectly realistic.

[bellamarie]

Oh praise the Lord, Jonathon has appeared!!!   Thank you, thank you, thank you.....I thought I was alone on an island of confusion all by myself.

Jonathon, " Fact and fiction ran together to make a good story. And her own life, it seems, was a curious combination. The best biographer would have a problem with sorting the one from the other." 

Amen, amen, I say amen!!!  Fact and fiction indeed, and good luck figuring out which is which, and who the narrator is!   

Jonathon, " Try convincing Wang Lung that it's an allegory. More likely it will eventually seem like a bad dream."

More like a nightmare he has gotten himself in!  Lotus and Cuckoo is like One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.  lolol  Oh Jonathon thank you for coming at just the right time, before I was about to throw this book across the room and say, enough of this! 

Welcome Dana and thank you for the insight of Pearl, " I don't think they're allegories."   

I agree with you and Jonathon, I don't think they are allegories either, although I do feel there are lessons to be learned in The Good Earth.

I did some browsing trying to learn a little more about Hilary Spurling, and I have come to the conclusion she writes for the shock value.  I think I would prefer Peter Conn's biography of Pearl.

http://www.amazon.com/Pearl-S-Buck-Cultural-Biography/dp/0521560802/ref=pd_cp_b_1

Ciao for now~

[JoanP]

Jonathan- We've been expecting you!  Please stick around, we need you!  Yes indeed,  Pearl Buck's work is  a combination of fact and fiction. That does account for the discrepancies in her work - even in memoirs of her own mother!
I'm not sure I agree with you about the allegorical nature of her fiction, though.    I've spent the last hour reading and re-reading Pearl Buck's acceptance speech when she received the Nobel Prize.  If so inclined, you might want to read it for yourself.  I'd love to hear what you think - about the differences between the Western and the Chinese novel.  (As Dana says, "she is writing in the style of the Chinese novel of the time" She says this herself in this speech, not just of Sons, but of the entire trilogy ...because, well, here, listen or read it  for yourself)-

Pearl Buck's Nobel Lecture

I came out of reading it with a new understanding - which is why I think the story we are reading is much more than one man's experience,  - but would love to hear your take on what Pearl Buck had to say about her work when lecturing on the Chinese novel - -

-The people created the novel, not scholars, not writers, but they came from the simple talk of the people.

-"For the Chinese novel was written primarily to amuse the common people. I mean enlightening that mind by pictures of life and what that life means. I mean encouraging the spirit not by rule-of-thumb talk about art, but by stories about the people in every age, and thus presenting to people simply themselves."

-  "The storyteller searched the dry annals of the history which the scholars had written, and with his fertile imagination, enriched by long acquaintance with common people, he clothed long-dead figures with new flesh and made them live again; he found stories of court life and intrigue and names of imperial favorites who had brought dynasties to ruin; he found, as he traveled from village to village, strange tales from his own times which he wrote down when he heard them. People told him of experiences they had had and he wrote these down, too, for other people."

- "From such humble and scattered beginnings, then, came the Chinese novel, written always in the vernacular, and dealing with all which interested the people, with legend and with myth, with love and intrigue, with brigands and wars, with everything, indeed, which went to make up the life of the people, high and low."

ps  - A question to consider, a decision to make after we finish The Good Earth.  Would you like to read the rest of the Trilogy when we're done - or at least start the second one, Sons - where The Good Earth leaves off?

pps  Jonathan - let's save the story of the end of her life until we've finished the book or we'll leave Wang Lung in the dust!

[Jonathan]

Thanks, Bellamarie, for the link to Peter Conn's bio of Pearl Buck. I'm going to get it. I'll never forgive you, if you fling your book away now, and leave me in suspense about your feelings about the rest of the book. You have made your encounter with this book a real revelation for me. I'm baffled by it the way you are and haven't known what to say about it.

Thanks, JoanP, for the link to Pearl Buck's Nobel Prize acceptance address. You're right about getting a better understanding of her writing from it. So now we know. She was aiming for the pei hua style of Chinese narrative in her novel. The simple talk of the people.

Hi, Ginny,I hope your butting in serves as a good example for others!! What do you think? Does Buck make a good argument for the great missionary efforts in China? Or did she see the futility?

Thanks to all of you for your interesting posts. I can't believe the old man's moral indignation about the harlot. I'm convinced it's the expense he's worried about. On the other hand, I can't help feeling that Mao Tse-tung must have read that Nobel speech and felt there was a need for a Cultural Revolution in China. Didn't he have some kind of back to the good earth policy for people who disagreed with him?

[Jonathan]

Leaving Wang Lung in the dust. Heavens no, JoanP, he's had troubles enough.

[JoanP]

Perhaps we need to read more of the book to decide what Pearl Buck intended to convey - to tell a story of what she has learned and experienced in China?  Do the characters represent those experiences?  Has Pearl written a parable, perhaps? - Shall we be watching for a moral?
The themes expressed so far: - Wang's relationship with the Earth, Wealth destroys his basic values, the position of women in his household.

Should have said "leaving Wang Lung in the dirt," Jonathan
Happily back working the land now that he is cured of the love sickness.  What cured him? He really doesn't care what Lotus thinks of him now, does he?  

Right from the start of chapter 22 the narrator refers to Lotus as a  "symbol"...and Wang Lung is pleased with  his status in the town because of his beautiful concubine.  Also pleased with his fine sons and his good housekeeper, his wife.

Dana finds Olan too perfect, too accepting of the situation.  Does she have a choice? I'm wondering why she would  suggest bringing slaves into the house to cure her elder son's restlessness.  What would this accomplish?  

Jonathan - I think you're on to something when you speak of Mao's interest in Pearl Buck's writing of the common people.

[bellamarie]

Oh my heavens, I am only on chapter 26 and I can barely read any further. I seriously had to stop and bookmark my page because the tears are just flowing, and I feel like my heart could jump out of my body. I am hurting so very much for O-lan.  There is so much going on in these chapters, it is difficult to know where to begin discussing it.

I think I will need to take a break and come back before beginning to discuss these chapters.  But, I do need to say I feel this book is more like reading my Bible, than a novel.  It has all the parables, stories and events that takes place in the Old and New testaments.  I realized it when the locusts came.  I thought, oh my goodness, its like the plagues in the Bible!  So now with that thought I will leave and come back when I can sort out some thoughts and let my feelings cease.  I'm just not sure I can bare to read the next chapters, for fear of knowing what comes next for O-lan.  

Ciao for now~

p.s. JoanP,  I just glanced up at your post and saw this, " Has Pearl written a parable, perhaps? - Shall we be watching for a moral?"

Since I had written my post before seeing yours, I suppose I answered your question.  I have always seen morals in this book from the very beginning.  I can see now, why it won the awards it did.  Got to go settle myself with something else for a bit.

Jonathon, I will see it to the end, but this book as I said early on, is NOT for sissies.  I live in a bubble of happiness, love, faith and hope there is good in kindness in everyone, I just have to look deep sometimes to see it.  The pain in these chapters are almost unbearable.  I need to switch over to Pride & Prejudice with Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy's bantering to bring me back to my happy place....

[JoanP]

" tears are just flowing, and I feel like my heart could jump out of my body. I am hurting so very much for O-lan."  Bellamarie

As difficult as her life has been, there have been many bright spots, compensations... It hasn't been all bad, especially considering her expectations when a young girl, a slave in the House of Hwang, don't you think? That's what surprised me - that she, considering her former position, would suggest providing her son with a young slave to play with, until a suitable wife came along.  

I wonder how many of you consider O-lan to be the  heroine of this story?  I've read that many people do.  I keep in mind what you said, Dana - that she is an "unrealistic heroine."  We never really see her react, we see an occasional tear... We feel for her, but Olan seems to know her situation is as good as it gets - and never really expected more. Don't  you think that if Pearl B considered O-lan to be her heroine, she would have kept her in the story long enough to move back into the big house of Hwang - as Wang Lung is planning to do -  this time with Cuckoo as her slave?  She opted not to do that, continued her story with Wang Lung...his love for the land...and his pride.     

[mabel1015j]

I wouldn't make too much of Buck being documented by Herbert Hoover. Anyone who had any international connections was thought by Hoover to be a little "pink"(communist). Even the YWCA, because it was an international organization, had a file, and Jane Addams, because she was a pacifist and met with people in Europe to try to end WWI, and ELEANOR ROOSEVELT who Buck was friendly with - probably all of the women and men involved in the social issues of the time had a file.

Ginny, you will love Buck's house. Since she lived there and had her adoption agency office there, all of her furnishings are there just like they were when she lived there and they even have some of her clothing. It's not like some estates where they had to go find furnishings similar to what she might have had.

The Peter Conn book is excellent and easily read.

Jean

[JoanP]

Jean - I remember asking you for a definition of a cultural biography when you first spoke of Peter Conn -  before reading The Good Earth. Thank you for bringing his work to our attention.  Besides Pearl's pacifist" leanings, international connections with communists when in China, there were other activities which added to her fat FBI file.

Conn writes:  

"Buck's efforts on behalf of equality included tireless support for women's rights. She promoted modern birth control and called her friend Margaret Sanger "one of the most courageous women of our times," a person whose name "would go down in history" as a modern crusader for justice. In the 1930s and 1940s, Buck also spoke out repeatedly in support of an Equal Rights Amendment for women, at a time when opposition to it included the majority of organized women's groups.
 
As a highly visible proponent of international understanding and of civil rights for women and African-Americans, Pearl Buck inevitably attracted the hostile curiosity of FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. Buck's FBI file, which was initiated as early as 1937, reaches nearly three hundred pages, of which a little over two-thirds has been declassified. (I am still appealing for release of the other material.) The paltry gossip and innuendo in these pages would be amusing if it were not outrageous, a sad reminder of the paranoia that has infected America's domestic politics for over half a century."

I wonder if it is thought that Pearl B. wrote The Good Earth to bring attention to women's rights - (or lack of them) in China.  If so, then the all the women, Lotus, the Poor Little -  even Cuckoo might have been her focus - and Olan might well have been the heroine of the novel...