Money To Wang Lung example essay topic

Every human being is the author of his own health or disease. In the book, The Good Earth, the writer Pearl S. Buck wrote this amazing story about an honest farmer, Wang Lung. The book follows the life of its principal character from his marriage day to his old age. In this book, Wang Lung it's definitely a dynamic character because he goes through a lot of changes. He changes from a loving, hard-working man of the earth to a proud, careless, insensitive lord. Does success and money change him?

Was Wang Lung destroyed by his ambition? Life belongs to the living, and he who lives must be prepared for changes. The story is a sense of dramatic reality. Wang Lung gives us a tremendous taste of what may come to you when ambition and pride take over you. At the beginning of the book, it all started on the day of his marriage. He grew up in an isolated, illiterate community where patriarchal piety is the core value, and survival depends on endless physical labor.

Since Wang Lung's father was a poor man, he had few options on choosing a wife. Wang Lung, on his way to get his wife, he gave money to a beggar. After all he was a good man. "He was pleased and he threw into the beggar's bowl two small cash... ". (p. 12).

This shows his sympathy and compassion. He had a good heart and it's proven when he told his woman to take the box and the basket. Since she could not handle it, he helped her. "And he shifted the box to his own back, regardless of the best robe he wore... ". (p. 19). He also loved his first son. He didn't' care about the money, he only cared about buying new clothes to his son.

"But now for the first time such giving was not pain. He saw, the silver in the alien hand of a merchant in town; he saw the silver transmuted into something worth even more than itself - clothes upon the body of his son", (p. 35). Wang Lung was a good man, incapable of killing anyone. There were times of trouble when they had nothing to eat and he had to kill his ox.

He didn't dare to do it. "Let it be killed then, but I cannot do it". (p. 72). Even though girls were almost worthless and usually sold as slaves, Wan Lung loved his two daughters, specially his little fool. .".. she essayed a weak smile with her toothless gums showing, he broke into tears and took into his lean hard hand her small claw and held the tiny gasp of her fingers over his forefinger. Thereafter he would sometimes lift her, all naked as she lay, and thrust her inside the scant warmth of his coat against his flesh... ". (p. 77-78). Wang Lung's identity and motives are shaped above all by his relationship to the land. The property he farms has been in his family for generations.

He worked hard night and day to prosper and make of the land the best. He was a hard-working man. "He put his hoe upon his shoulder and he walked to his plots of land and he cultivated the rows of grain, and he yoked the ox to the plow and he ploughed the western field for garlic and onions". (p. 17). All his life was for the land. Wang Lung was born in his land, lives in his land, worked in his land, and lived for his land. "He took his life from the earth; drop by drop by his sweat he wrung food from it and from the food, silver", (p. 35).

For many men, the acquisition of wealth does not end their troubles; it only brings more to their lives. Wang Lung was going through this. For his land, he was tempted to sell his daughter! "It would be better perhaps that that she be sold into a rich house... ". (p. 120).

This shows his transformation from a loving man to a careless. He rather sells his daughter for the benefit of himself. "Well, and if I did, she is not worth her weight in gold and rubies. If she bring enough to take us back to the land... ". (p. 120). His desperation to go back to his land even took him to steal money. When he was in the south, someone opened the gate and he went to see what was going on.

He saw a fat man lying on the bed. Since the man didn't wanted to get kill he gave money to Wang Lung. "Out of my sight, lest I kill you for a fat worm... ". (p. 140). It is a man's own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways. Wang Lung was building his own death. Wang Lung's prosperity is short lived.

His prosperity increased and that leads him to buy the great house of the Hwang. All his family moved in. "And Wang Lung took it into his heart to eat dainty foods, and he himself, who once had been well satisfies with good wheaten bread wrapped about a stick of garlic, now that he slept late in the day and did not work with his own hands on the land, now he was not easily pleased with this dish... ". (p. 302). He was rich now and didn't work. He lived like a careless, insensitive lord. He created his two monsters, his two sons.

He did whatever his sons told him to do. Since wanted to be in peace, he pleased his sons in all ways. The eldest son wasted money while the other second one saved it. Wang Lung didn't showed his sons what was a reality of endless physical work. They lived as princess and didn't care about he land but the money. He is eventually punished at the end for his irresponsibility towards teaching his son satisfactions, pride, and ambition instead of honesty, hard work and reality.

A chronicle of natural calamity and political turmoil, Wang Lung's familiar world is turned upside down. The way the author ended the book was surprising". But over the old man's head they looked at each other and smiled". (p. 360). This last scene is a prophecy that disaster lies ahead. Since his sons don't share the commitment to the land, disaster will come upon them.

These are modern men, contemptuous of their peasant father and his antique values. Wang Lung is a character punished by his ambition, his sons were the cause of his death. What he did wrong is to raise his children in a different environment from the one he was raised. His sons care more about the money than the land.

The land had no meaning to them at all. They care more about their appearance and what the others would say. His sons didn't experience what was to work hard so they didn't care. As I wrote in the my first sentence, every human being is the author of his own health or disease..