A Study Of Pearl S. Buck’s The Good Earth Trilogy From The Perspective Of Literary Anthropology

As an American woman writer, Pearl S. Buck is famous for her literary works of the Chinese subject matter. Her representative work, The Good Earth Trilogy, mainly focuses on the real living conditions of the lowest peasants during the early 20th century China. The trilogy achieves a huge success, not only because it has presented an unfamiliar and real world to the Western world, but also because of the deep meaning of human subjectivity as well as the rich anthropological materials in it. Analyzed from the perspective of literary anthropology, the trilogy is found to have the universal elements of anthropology. Pearl Buck has made a vivid and detailed description in the trilogy which covers almost every aspect of the daily life of the Chinese peasants, whereby making it possible for the Westerners to approach and understand the Chinese, Chinese peasants in particular.The thesis begins with an analysis of the traditional Chinese customs and folk cultures described in the trilogy, including the folk cultures of marriage, deity and festivals, which are universal and closely related to other cultures. These traditional customs and folk cultures also affect and interact with each other, which is a significant factor and a core concern of the anthropological study. The thesis then continues to explore the traditional Confucian ethics and morals presented in the trilogy, which provides a massive amount of vivid anthropological documentation of the ethics and morals during that time in China. The thesis also discusses the intercultural communication presented by Pearl Buck in the trilogy and her attitudes toward this matter.