Pearl S. Buck

[vison]

Always loved Pearl Buck's books and am rereading them right now.

I love Pavillion of Women best.

[Primula Baggins]

I have only ever read The Good Earth, which I read as a little girl. We would spend several weeks every summer at my mother's parents' house in Boulder, Colorado, and there was nothing, nothing for us kids to do but read. They had a lot of Reader's Digest Condensed Books, which in retrospect were probably a good thing; I read a lot of potboilers without wasting a lot of time on them. But they also had all of Louisa May Alcott and Robin Hood and Heidi and Bambi (Felix Salten's original novel) and The Swiss Family Robinson (I have those books now)—and The Good Earth. I think it was the first book I ever read that was both cynical and tragic. And the first to show the place of women in a culture in a way that made me want to yell at people, without the writer telling me to do it. I was nine or ten the first time I read it.

So, Pavilion of Women; what else would you recommend, vison?

[vison]

I read somewhere that Pearl Buck wrote The Good Earth and some of her other books in Chinese, then translated them into English. She was born in the US but her missionary parents took her to China when she was a baby and she grew up speaking both Chinese and English.

"Peony" is one I love. "Imperial Woman", about the last empress of China.

She also wrote short stories, some of which have stuck in my mind for years.

I met a woman years ago whose life was much like Buck's. This woman, Alex, had been born in China to English missionaries and her family had to leave China after Mao took power. She could never go back, and it broke her heart. I wonder if she finally did get to go, after things loosened up? She would have been a very old lady by then, though.

At any rate, Pearl Buck is one of those writers who is now neglected and ignored, and it's too bad. John O'Hara is another.

[vison]

I listened to a fascinating radio interview with this author who has written several novels about Chinese women. She has written one about Pearl S. Buck and she spoke at length about Mrs. Buck. It's on my list for this winter.

The author herself has an amazing life story.