Pearl S. Buck's The Good Earth

(Exposition pg.1-8) In the novel, The Good Earth, by Pearl S. Buck, Wang Lung, a poor farmer who lived in Anhwei province, hurried about his house to prepare for his marriage. However, being the poor man he was, he couldn’t afford to marry proper woman, so he had to marry a slave, an ugly one, for a pretty slave wouldn’t be a virgin. It was true that O-lan, Wang Lung’s wife, had no beauty in her, but she was very skillful and hardworking. She always did as she was told, but she rarely talked. Soon enough, she conceived a son, a sign of good fortune. Gradually, Wang Lung became prosperous. Meanwhile, at the House of Hwang, the place where O-lan had been a slave, people were spending money wastefully, slowly descending into poverty. With the money he made, Wang Lung bought fertile land from the House of Hwang. …show more content…
However, with his riches also came his uncle, a very poor and greedy man. Seeing Wang Lung’s riches, he began to come to him for money. At the same time that his uncle came, O-lan gave birth to a girl, a bad omen, and from that day on, things began to go downhill for Wang Lung; his village suffered a drought, causing hunger. Then, knowing that they’d die if they continue to stay at the village, Wang Lung and his family went to the south, where he labored to earn some money, while his children and O-lan became beggars. During his stay in the south, he constantly desired to return to his land, and finally, he had enough money to do so when the poor, including his family, raided the house of a rich man. Before long, he was working on his fields once again, his house fully restored. In the south, O-lan had stolen a stash of jewelry from the rich man’s house, and out of all the jewelry, O-lan kept two pearls. With the rest of the jewelry, Wang Lung bought more land from the Hwang family, which had fallen

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