A Study of Chinese Images in Pearl S. Buck's The Good Earth

Abstract

Pear S. Buck is a famous American female writer and Nobel Prize winner in Literature in 1938. Buck has lived in China for 41 years. Chinese culture has a profound influence on her works. Most of her works reflect the conflict, understanding and integration of the two heterogeneous cultures between America and China. In recent years, the researches on Buck have boomed dramatically, while there is still a deficiency in the study of Buck's characterization of Chinese images from an American perspective. Based on the traditional images of Chinese in the Good Earth, this thesis reveals the characteristics of Chinese traditional family members shaped by Pearl S. Buck through analyzing the characters of a peasant family and their relations. At the same time, this thesis also explores the characteristics of the kinship relationship written by the native Chinese authors, and compares the two from a comparative perspective, so as to find out the differences between the images of traditional Chinese characters shaped by the American author, Pearl Buck, and other native Chinese writers as well as the causes of these differences.