Review: The Good Earth (by Pearl S. Buck)

My Rating: 4 stars

Pearl S. Buck's The Good Earth is one of those famous classics that I should have read in school but never did so I'm reading it for the first time now since it was chosen as a book of the month for one of my book clubs. I will admit that I was a bit apprehensive about reading this book at first, as I had heard about the long-running controversy over Buck's credibility writing this book as a Westerner with no ties to China or Chinese culture other than having lived there for a period of time. As someone who is already very familiar with Chinese culture (partly because of my Chinese heritage but also because I majored in Asian studies in college with an emphasis in Chinese history and literature), I was concerned about how the story would be told from an authenticity perspective and in a way, I was preparing myself to be critical. Now after having read the book, I am happy to see that Buck actually got quite a lot of things right in her portrayal of what life was like for a Chinese farmer and his family back during the pre-revolutionary era. Buck covers a lot of ground with her fictional story of Wang Lung, his wife O-lan, their family, and the significance of the land (the aptly titled "good earth"), bringing to light many of the social issues that were prevalent back in those days (some of which are still relevant even today). For me, the attitudes toward women as well as the class differences between the rich and the poor were what stood out the most and I can definitely see how the realistic rendering of these issues by Buck through the cycle of Wang Lung's life would've made this a difficult read for some. I myself sympathized greatly with O-lan and despite already knowing what I do about the culture and that it was considered "normal" for women to be treated that way back in those days, it was still heartbreaking to read.

There is so much worth talking about in this book that I don't think I would be able to do any justice to it in such a short review. The story itself seems relatively simple but is superbly told and while most of the characters were not likable, they were realistically drawn and were instrumental in giving us a glimpse into the behaviors and attitudes of that time period. Reading this book brought back memories of my previous trips to China (the most recent one being less than 10 years ago) where I had witnessed first-hand some of the customs and superstitions that were brought up in this book. On one of the trips, we visited a few villages in remote parts of China and I remember how blown away I felt seeing locals engaging in customs and practices that we would find abhorrent and unacceptable, yet for them, it is the "normal way of life" – as natural to them as breathing or eating. It also humbled me to see the conditions that many of these locals lived in – multiple family members crammed into small huts not unlike the ones Wang Lung and his family lived in during the time when they were in the city begging for food – simple dwellings where to have a separate "bathroom" (if you could call a hole in the ground surrounded by 3 long wooden boards a bathroom) with a door on it is considered a "luxury." It reminded me again just how much we take for granted given all the modern conveniences and comforts we have. Of course, the above is just a small portion of the big picture and it can be argued that the actual number of people living in such conditions is probably insignificant given China's vast population and the fact that much of China is truly modernized now (in some cases, maybe even more so than some first world cities). It would be unfair to paint the entire country under the same brush and there is no doubt that China has undergone sweeping changes in the past century that should not be overlooked or forgotten.  However that doesn't change the reality that, in some parts of the country, life truly is difficult as it was portrayed in the story.

I found out recently that this book is actually part of a trilogy. I'm not a fan of book series in general and to be honest, I feel that this book worked well as a stand alone, but since I liked this first one well enough, I will probably read the other 2 books as well some time in the future. Hopefully the sequels are as good as the original.