Melanie Rose
Apr 20, 2009
Essays / The Good Earth, Pearl S. Buck [4]
Here is my essay that I wrote in an hour and 15 minutes.I choose #5 on the list above.
Please give me feedback if you wish, I know theres probably going to be quite a few errors. Tomorrow in our Honors English class we do peer editing but I figured I would also put it on this wonderful website too. ;)
The Chinese Concept of Subjugation of Women
The concept of women and women's rights has not only been a struggle for the American culture but also other cultures, such as the Chinese culture. For many years in America, women have fought for equal sex rights. The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck was published in 1931, when American women were still fighting for their rights, but at this time no women in China seemed to stand up and fight for their rights. They live by what they've known from previous generations of seeing their mothers and grandmothers being treated so; being sold off for marriage, being a slave in a house,and could not work a "real" job ,or talk to men as if what they said mattered, and they couldn't even walk side-by-side of a man, they had to walk behind all men.
At the beginning of the novel, The Good Earth, Wang Lung set up arrangements to find "his women". Not his soulmate or companion for the rest of his life but "his women". He goes to the Great House in search of finding a women slave named O-lan. He talks to the Great Mistress of the house, as she describes O-lan as,
"This woman came into our house when she was a child of ten and here she has lived until now, when she is twenty years old. I bought her in a year of famine when her parents came south because they had nothing to eat. They were from the north in Shantug and there they returned, and I know nothing further or them. You see she has the strong body and the square cheeks of her kind. She will work well for you in the field and drawing water and all else that you wish. She is not beautiful but that you do not need. Only men of leisure have the need for beautiful women to divert them. Neither is she clever. But she does well what she is told to do and she has a good temper. So far as I know she is a virgin. She has not beauty enough to tempt my sons and grandsons even if she had not been in the kitchen. If there has been anything it has been only a serving man. But with the innumerable and pretty slaves running freely about the courts, I doubt if there has been anyone. Take her and use her well. She is a good slave, although somewhat slow and stupid, and had I not wished to acquire merit at the temply for my future existence by bringing more life into the world I should have kept her, for she is good enought for the kitchen. But I marry my slaves off if any will have them and the lords do not want them" (18).
O-lan is treated as if they were selling cattle. She is being sold off. The Mistress says," look at her strong body and square cheeks of her kind" (18) trying to persuade Wang Lung that she will be able to work well and strong. This reminds me of when they buy oxen in the book, "this ox is very strong and works well," says the salesperson. Can you imagine your family selling you off to a man, or the Great House, where you could possibly be beaten or even raped? Of course, the woman or maybe still a child, had no choice or say in which man she wanted to be with the rest of her life. They couldn't yell when they were beaten, as this is what woman do not do. They endure the pain, and are silent, as it is not acceptable to tell the man,"no", because he owns you. You own the cattle or ox who you can command and slap, just as the man in the chinese culture owns the women, doing whatever he may wish with her.
One day when Wang Lung was working out in the fields he began thinking about O-lan, " Sometimes, working over the clods in the fields, he would fall to pondering about her. What had she seen in those hundred courts? What had been her life, that life she never shared with him? He could make nothing of it. And then he was ashamed of his own curiousity and of his interest in her. She was, after all, only a woman" (29). This quote is huge on the way women are viewed in the Chinese culture. Women were so low, so worthless, that you don't spend time thinking about your own wife that you just got married to. He felt even ashamed, becuase men do not think or worry about unimportant things like women.
She did not at once take the money, but she stood looking at it her face motionless. Then she said in a half whisper,
"It is the first time I have had silver money in my hand."(34) This is when O-lan asks for some money from Wang Lung to buy some cloth so she can clothe the new born son. Women are not allowed to have money, or earn money at this time in the Chinese culture. You had to ask the owner for any kind of money or anything you needed. This shocked me when I first read it, because O-lan was so astonished by even holding the money, to be allowed to do that. Money is everything, you can go places with it, get things with it. Money, being such a powerful object is something women were not allowed to have in this culture.
The Good Earth, by Peal S. Buck shows that women were very subjugated in the Chinese culture. I think it really shows me anyways that I am grateful to have my freedom, as even some people today still do not have any rights based on their sex, religion, ethinicty. This book shows the subjugation of women in a very powerful way, and makes us look back on the past. How far we have come in America, united we stand, equal people, no matter of skin color, religion, or race. Some countries still struggle with this issue today, and from this book I am patriotic and grateful of our land of the free, America.
Here is my essay that I wrote in an hour and 15 minutes.I choose #5 on the list above.
Please give me feedback if you wish, I know theres probably going to be quite a few errors. Tomorrow in our Honors English class we do peer editing but I figured I would also put it on this wonderful website too. ;)
The Chinese Concept of Subjugation of Women
The concept of women and women's rights has not only been a struggle for the American culture but also other cultures, such as the Chinese culture. For many years in America, women have fought for equal sex rights. The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck was published in 1931, when American women were still fighting for their rights, but at this time no women in China seemed to stand up and fight for their rights. They live by what they've known from previous generations of seeing their mothers and grandmothers being treated so; being sold off for marriage, being a slave in a house,and could not work a "real" job ,or talk to men as if what they said mattered, and they couldn't even walk side-by-side of a man, they had to walk behind all men.
At the beginning of the novel, The Good Earth, Wang Lung set up arrangements to find "his women". Not his soulmate or companion for the rest of his life but "his women". He goes to the Great House in search of finding a women slave named O-lan. He talks to the Great Mistress of the house, as she describes O-lan as,
"This woman came into our house when she was a child of ten and here she has lived until now, when she is twenty years old. I bought her in a year of famine when her parents came south because they had nothing to eat. They were from the north in Shantug and there they returned, and I know nothing further or them. You see she has the strong body and the square cheeks of her kind. She will work well for you in the field and drawing water and all else that you wish. She is not beautiful but that you do not need. Only men of leisure have the need for beautiful women to divert them. Neither is she clever. But she does well what she is told to do and she has a good temper. So far as I know she is a virgin. She has not beauty enough to tempt my sons and grandsons even if she had not been in the kitchen. If there has been anything it has been only a serving man. But with the innumerable and pretty slaves running freely about the courts, I doubt if there has been anyone. Take her and use her well. She is a good slave, although somewhat slow and stupid, and had I not wished to acquire merit at the temply for my future existence by bringing more life into the world I should have kept her, for she is good enought for the kitchen. But I marry my slaves off if any will have them and the lords do not want them" (18).
O-lan is treated as if they were selling cattle. She is being sold off. The Mistress says," look at her strong body and square cheeks of her kind" (18) trying to persuade Wang Lung that she will be able to work well and strong. This reminds me of when they buy oxen in the book, "this ox is very strong and works well," says the salesperson. Can you imagine your family selling you off to a man, or the Great House, where you could possibly be beaten or even raped? Of course, the woman or maybe still a child, had no choice or say in which man she wanted to be with the rest of her life. They couldn't yell when they were beaten, as this is what woman do not do. They endure the pain, and are silent, as it is not acceptable to tell the man,"no", because he owns you. You own the cattle or ox who you can command and slap, just as the man in the chinese culture owns the women, doing whatever he may wish with her.
One day when Wang Lung was working out in the fields he began thinking about O-lan, " Sometimes, working over the clods in the fields, he would fall to pondering about her. What had she seen in those hundred courts? What had been her life, that life she never shared with him? He could make nothing of it. And then he was ashamed of his own curiousity and of his interest in her. She was, after all, only a woman" (29). This quote is huge on the way women are viewed in the Chinese culture. Women were so low, so worthless, that you don't spend time thinking about your own wife that you just got married to. He felt even ashamed, becuase men do not think or worry about unimportant things like women.
She did not at once take the money, but she stood looking at it her face motionless. Then she said in a half whisper,
"It is the first time I have had silver money in my hand."(34) This is when O-lan asks for some money from Wang Lung to buy some cloth so she can clothe the new born son. Women are not allowed to have money, or earn money at this time in the Chinese culture. You had to ask the owner for any kind of money or anything you needed. This shocked me when I first read it, because O-lan was so astonished by even holding the money, to be allowed to do that. Money is everything, you can go places with it, get things with it. Money, being such a powerful object is something women were not allowed to have in this culture.
The Good Earth, by Peal S. Buck shows that women were very subjugated in the Chinese culture. I think it really shows me anyways that I am grateful to have my freedom, as even some people today still do not have any rights based on their sex, religion, ethinicty. This book shows the subjugation of women in a very powerful way, and makes us look back on the past. How far we have come in America, united we stand, equal people, no matter of skin color, religion, or race. Some countries still struggle with this issue today, and from this book I am patriotic and grateful of our land of the free, America.
