The Good Earth Book Report

One of the oldest books the Epic of Gilgamesh gives us a view on how the old civilization Mesopotamia and its people were it roots back to the year 2000 B.C.E. The book starts off by the King Gilgamesh sending a temple-prostitute to tame a wild man named Enkidu who acted like an animal in the grasslands. The temple-prostitute then sexualy charms him to win Enkidu’s trust. then convinces him to go back with her to the city. She then clothes him and teaches him how to eat cooked food and brewed beer and how to bathe. By her words it shows how the mesopotamians lived.

This book started with Wang Lung introducing himself and how his life is like. He lived with his father mostly because his father was really sick and Wang Lung had to take care of him. His father was a traditional and moral man. He did not approve many things that went on in the house. Later on, he went to the house of the Huang’s and got a slave to be his wife. Her name was O-Lan. O-Lan was a slave and she was treated really terribly most of her life, even when she married Wang Lung. Together they had 5 children: three boys and two girls, each with very different characteristics.

In this rags-to-riches novel, Wang Lung rises from an obscure farmer living in poverty to a famous landowner living in luxury. As his story begins, Wang Lung is a poverty-stricken farmer who is setting out to collect the slave, O-lan, who has been purchased to serve him as wife. He is so poor that to him drinking tea,”Is like eating silver.” (Buck 4). He was so poor that he has never been asked for money by a beggar till the day he went to

The historical classic, “The Good Earth”, revolves around the life of Wang Lung, introducing the average Chinese farmer on his wedding day to the slave O-lan. Together, the newly married couple care for Wang Lung’s father and farm the land, prospering from the fruits of their labor. Their early life continues to bring great fortune when they are able to purchase land from the House of Hwang, who O-lan served, and when their first two children are born sons.

The novel, The Good Earth, by Pearl S. Buck, takes place outside of a small village in China during the early twentieth century. Women, during this time period, have little say in anything involving their lives. They are expected to take care of the house, as well as tending to the children and men of the family, whether it be the husband, his father, or brothers. Women possess the skills to provide for and serve the family, and that is what they do. In this novel Wang Lung is a typical, poor farmer. He spends his days tending to the fields and his father. When Wang Lung and O-lan marry, he is pleased that she models an adequate wife by doing what she is supposed to do and more. Lung’s life changes drastically once O-lan enters it. He gradually

The fact that Wang Lung is caring about a “slave”, as women were commonly referred to, shows that he deeply cares about his family. Even though Wang Lung loves his land, he cannot let go of his own. Wang Lung wants his sons and daughters to have happy

In Pearl S. Buck’s novel, The Good Earth, the protagonist, Wang Lung, starts out as a very poor farmer in China. He marries a slave named O-lan and starts a family with her. Famine soon strikes the town and there is no food to be found anywhere. Wang Lung moves his family South in hopes of finding a job there. Eventually, a group of poor people raid the homes of the rich. Wang Lung and O-lan both join in, getting away with enough gold and valuables to get back to their land in the North. Wang Lung uses this stolen money to buy more land and hire laborers. He quickly becomes one of the richest men in his town. Wang Lung, however, does not know that with great wealth comes great responsibility. His wealth corrupts him and his moral judgements become blurred. Wang

Wang Lung’s close bond with Earth comes out in this quote because he is saying how if they sell the land the family will become corrupt and they will lose everything. The land has done too much for them and you can’t just get rid of it. He continuously tells them that it will end their

Proceed at your own risk, since this gives awaya\ a great deal of the story.

The life of a poor farmer in China during the early twentieth century is full of its fair share of good and bad times. This is certainly true is Pearl S. Buck’s novel The Good Earth, which tells the story of the young Chinese peasant farmer Wang Lung and his journey through life. Throughout his journey, he is confronted with disasters, dilemmas, and tragedy, but is also at times blessed with good fortune at times. Through Wang Lung’s experiences and the rises and falls of his fortunes, The Good Earth conveys messages about life’s peaks and valleys, as stated by The New York Times, which said of The Good Earth, “A comment upon the meaning and tragedy of life as it is lived in any age in any quarter of the globe.”

Wang Lung’s first wife Olan, the mother of his children, is first introduced in chapter 1 when Wang Lung buys her from the royal family; she had been a slave there since childhood. It’s is constantly noted that she is not pretty, her feet too big and her features too wide for her thick-boned face. Although she is loyal, obedient, and quiet, Wang Lung doesn’t appreciate her as much as he should while she was alive. Before he had even met Olan, Wang Lung and his father had picked her role in their family, “We must have a woman who will tend the house and bear children as she works in the fields…” (Buck 9). Olan respectfully did all of these things, she kept the house tidy, bore Wang three sons and after giving birth, went into the fields to work

“Well, and I suppose that means you do not want to work on the land and I shall not have a son on my own land, and I with sons and to spare.’ This he said with bitterness, but the boy said nothing” This conversation between him and his son made him finally realize that they wouldn’t carry on their father’s great values, and that is because during the time he was rich he left some traditions behind. Wang lung valued his land and above all he had faith in his gods once again. Traditional values were forgotten by the result of wealthy living, the kids not caring about the farmlands and not understanding the earth gods prove that wealth destroyed ancient traditions.

Most parents hope for a better life for their children. To achieve this better life parents will work hard and often change their own lives. In The Good Earth by Pearl S Buck the reader sees how the life of Wang Lung, a farmer in the beginning of twentieth-century China, changes and how these changes affects the lives of his children, specifically his eldest son. Wang Lung’s eldest son grows up in an environment extremely different to Wang Lung’s own childhood which leads to him having a different view of wealth, different education, and a different place in society than his father had at seventeen.

When Mr. Li, the village leader, learned of the release of Wang Hou’e he found out that she had a 13-year-old son (Zhang Xuping). For some unknown reason, whether its pettiness or hatred, Mr. Li had Xuping expelled from school a day before his mother was released from prison (Crime and Punishment”). Once Xuping was expelled he worked as a waiter for 2 years before he drifted into petty crime at the age of 15. He was arrested in 2005, when he acted as a look out for a group of thieves.

Benjamin Franklin once said “Having been poor is no shame, being ashamed of it is.” What he meant by this, was that if one is poor because of circumstances outside of their control, there is no shame to them; it is not their fault. But if one is ashamed of being poor, is embarrassed with it, as Wang Lung is through the entire beginning of the novel, that makes being poor shameful. In the Good Earth, Pearl Buck uses the idea that money changes people to make Wang Lung a dynamic character, a trait that causes people to spend special attention to him. If someone is interesting, as I believe Wang Lung to be, it means they have a trait that causes a special sort of attention paid to he or she. He was so embarrassed and ashamed of his finances, when