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3.98 AVERAGE
3.98 AVERAGE
I rated this book 4/5 stars, and I read it over a period of 124 days. I found plot to be interesting, but not necessarily related to the tag line on the cover. There was no mention of the Japanese until the end of the book when one Japanese man yelled "banzai" at the man writing out his report, Wu Lien.
I couldn't really tell what was meant to be the main theme at first. Then slowly I realized the theme was resistance and keeping yourself able to resist. Ling Tan kept his family healthy by not really providing everything he grew to the enemy. He understood what he needed to do to protect his wife and children, and he did it. He did not take the offer made to him by his son-in-law, Wu Lien, because he didn't think that they should just kowtow to the enemy like that. I would have liked to see more of that thought line. Why was the enemy specifically in the village and why did Ling Tan find them so abhorrent?
I thought the story was decent. I didn't give it the fifth star partly because of the way one thing in particular was said. Ling Sao (Ling Tan's wife) said that if a woman could not find a husband, she may as well kill herself because what else could she do? That line rubbed me all sorts of the wrong way. I understand that's what it was like back then, but that certainly isn't the way now. Overall, I did like the book enough to pick up more by Pearl S. Buck in the future.
I couldn't really tell what was meant to be the main theme at first. Then slowly I realized the theme was resistance and keeping yourself able to resist. Ling Tan kept his family healthy by not really providing everything he grew to the enemy. He understood what he needed to do to protect his wife and children, and he did it. He did not take the offer made to him by his son-in-law, Wu Lien, because he didn't think that they should just kowtow to the enemy like that. I would have liked to see more of that thought line. Why was the enemy specifically in the village and why did Ling Tan find them so abhorrent?
I thought the story was decent. I didn't give it the fifth star partly because of the way one thing in particular was said. Ling Sao (Ling Tan's wife) said that if a woman could not find a husband, she may as well kill herself because what else could she do? That line rubbed me all sorts of the wrong way. I understand that's what it was like back then, but that certainly isn't the way now. Overall, I did like the book enough to pick up more by Pearl S. Buck in the future.
Well, this wasn't exactly sweetness and light, this was after all a book about war, but finely and sympathetically drawn for all that. I think Buck's touch with characters was better in this book than in The Good Earth, and while the book deals with pain, war, and death, yet there is a little element of the power of will and hope nonetheless. Loved the family and how family-centered the book was.