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User talk:KevinDavis (view source)
Revision as of 23:12, September 23, 2011
, 23:12, September 23, 2011→Pearl S. Buck and The Good Earth
I admit I haven't read the book in a while, so I would appreciate it if you would please explain and ''reference'' the connections to communism you believe exist in ''The Good Earth'' - otherwise I'm going to remove it. --[[User:SharonW|SharonW]] 00:32, 23 September 2011 (EDT)
I admit I haven't read the book in a while, so I would appreciate it if you would please explain and ''reference'' the connections to communism you believe exist in ''The Good Earth'' - otherwise I'm going to remove it. --[[User:SharonW|SharonW]] 00:32, 23 September 2011 (EDT)
:Later in life, Buck was highly critical of her father; specifically, see her work ''Fighting Angel'', which portrays her father in less than a flattering light. Buck explicitly described her father's missionary work as part and parcel of Western imperialism. Hardly a positive view of evangelical efforts, wouldn't you agree? Also, several of her political views (particularly, her support for "women's rights" and the left-leaning progressive movements) led to substantial disagreement between her and the Presbyterian group that employed her as a missionary, thus leading directly to her resignation from that group. Finally, her husband worked primarily as an agricultural economist for the Chinese government; his missionary work was a distant second to his agricultural studies. Marxists critized his work in later years, but the vast majority of this criticism occurred during the Cultural Revolution in China, which in its nationalistic fervor lashed out at all ideas Western, regardless of their political orientation.
:I believe I have presented enough about Pearl S. Buck and her husband to satisfy your curiosity. As for ''The Good Earth'' itself, I won't engage you with too much detail, for the sake of brevity. However, the novel contains a sizeable amount of discussion of the protagonist's agrarian background, which exemplifies the agrarian school of thought popular with Chinese Communists. Mao himself was famous for his application of Marxist principles to the primarily agrarian economy of China, despite Marx's idea that a revolution could only occur in an advanced industrial society. Although ''The Good Earth'' contains elements of Algerian novels of the 19th century, it also contains numerous anti-capitalist implications, i.e. the mob that destroys the house of a wealthy city dweller, and Wang Lung's sadness at the end of the novel, despite his hard work and the affluence he has provided for his family. Finally, his actions involving the concubine Lotus make me question the moral standing of the author.
:I hope that the information above is informative; if you have any other questions, feel free to let me know. Thank you! [[User:KevinDavis|Kevin Davis]] <sup>[[User talk:KevinDavis|Talk]]</sup> 19:12, 23 September 2011 (EDT)