1931Pulitzer 1932
The Good Earth
Pearl S. Buck · 1892–1973 · United States / China
Why it matters
A Chinese farmer's rise from poverty to wealth is shadowed by the moral compromises prosperity demands. An enormous international bestseller that helped introduce Chinese peasant life to Western readers.
At a glance
family sagahistorical fiction
Difficulty 3/10medium pace368 pagesPlain prose deliberately modeled on oral storytelling.
Deep dive
Wang Lung builds his entire fortune out of a devotion to the land bordering on religion — and Buck spends the whole novel quietly testing whether that kind of faith survives past the generation that needed it.
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