To Live Yu Huo Death

His moral ambiguity is heavily influenced by outside forces in his life that changes his view upon the world. The most excusable action in the eyes of the readers is when he commits a crime because his family is struggling in the southern city. Other citizens stricken by poverty tell Wang Lung that the riches do not belong to the wealthy, but to the poor. This conflicts with his belief that God determines one’s fate and way in life. Wang Lung goes against his morals and commits robbery because of his influence from others and the situation he was thrust into. This action determines Wang Lung’s wealthy future, but also symbolizes overcoming an obstacle, in this case, overcoming his internal conflict with his morals. The audience begins to notice the shift in Wang Lung’s character which will continue to develop negatively as his values are no longer intact.

The Death of Woman Wang, by Jonathan Spence is an educational historical novel of northeastern China during the seventeenth century. The author's focus was to enlighten a reader on the Chinese people, culture, and traditions. Spence's use of the provoking stories of the Chinese county T'an-ch'eng, in the province of Shantung, brings the reader directly into the course of Chinese history. The use of the sources available to Spence, such as the Local History of T'an-ch'eng, the scholar-official Huang Liu-hung's handbook and stories of the writer P'u Sung-Ling convey the reader directly into the lives of poor farmers, their workers and wives. The intriguing structure of The Death of Woman Wang consists on observing these people working on

Shen Fu was a Chinese writer and art dealer who lived during the Qing Dynasty. He had a very strong love for his wife Chen Yun and she is the inspiration for his book “Six Records of a Floating Life”, which vividly describes their life and love together. Shen Fu discusses the happiness that he found in marriage to his cousin Yun, in his first chapter, “Joys of the Wedding Chamber”. He then goes into detail, and is even reminiscent, about enjoying the little things and his experiences with them in the second part of his book, “Pleasure of Leisure”. Next Shen Fu talks about the adversities that he and Yun have to experience, in their sometimes-trying

Once the novel comes to an end, we notice clearly the way Wang Lung changed. In the beginning of the novel we learned many ancient Chinese traditions by observing Wang Lung as a simple peasant, but as he becomes a wealthy landowner his life collapses. This rapid change of social class makes it difficult for anyone who intends to keep their traditional values until their death. This fantastic novel by Pearl S. Buck reminds us that we can never forget our traditional values, because if that happens your life will collapse just the way Wang Lung unfortunately

When Jing Mei recognizes the similarities between her mother and herself she begins to understand not only her mother but herself as well. There are subtle connections and likenesses from the beginning between Jing Mei and her mother that Jing Mei does not see. The book commences with Jing Mei taking her mother's place at the mah jong table, creating a similarity between them from the beginning. Suyuan dies two months before the start of the book, and therefore is not able to tell the stories. Jing Mei has learned and must tell her stories in her place, forming another parallelism between mother and daughter. Because Suyuan is dead, Jing Mei must act in place of her mother when she goes to meet her Chinese sisters in China. Throughout the book Jing Mei takes the place of Suyuan, showing she and her mother

The three men, the only good ones, participate in a ritualistic funeral ceremony. Wang Lifa picks up the death money. Wang ends up committing suicide. And so, good men die, and the corrupt survive and thrive. The Tea House becomes a set-up for spying. The government gets worse. One wonders if Lao She is really predicting the increasing corruption of the communist government which was to

However, their fortune is short-lived when bad omens rise because of Wang Lung’s insolent behavior towards his uncle’s family. Not only is their third child born a daughter, but a drought begins, preventing the land from cultivating and spreading both poverty and starvation through the North.

Even with her previous experiences at Beijing University and at Big Joy Farm, Wong still held some belief that the Chinese system wasn’t as bad as it was sometimes made out to be. This event proved to her that it was. “The enormity of the massacre hit home…Although it had been years since I was a Maoist, I still had harbored some small hope for China. Now even that was gone” (259). As a reporter Wong was able to view the progression of the protests in leading up to the massacre, and in viewing it understood that the Chinese people were much more independent than they had previously demonstrated over the past 50 years. She had continuously seen the Chinese people following what they were told between learning in school or with physical labor, yet this protest was one of the first large scale displays of the unacceptance of the regime by the people, and the government did not know what to do with it. But because of this, Wong was able to recognize that the people were not reliant on this way of life that they had previously been bound to, but truly could lead for themselves and take control. The massacre awakened Wong both to the reality that the government was not acting to benefit the people, and that the people were more than capable of acting for

In the end of the story, when Chunyu Fen returns from the Southern Bough, this is more of a personal change in his life. After his friends death Chunyu Fen did not drink and have sex (pp. 286). The change in his life was a way for Chunyu Fen to find balance in his life from all the bad choices he made in his younger years. So, this moment reflects Taoism more than

This book started with Wang Lung introducing himself and how his life is like. He lived with his father mostly because his father was really sick and Wang Lung had to take care of him. His father was a traditional and moral man. He did not approve many things that went on in the house. Later on, he went to the house of the Huang’s and got a slave to be his wife. Her name was O-Lan. O-Lan was a slave and she was treated really terribly most of her life, even when she married Wang Lung. Together they had 5 children: three boys and two girls, each with very different characteristics.

To do so, Fugui attempts to maintain his ‘face’ in the commune by donating the most steel and telling his son to work rather than sleep. Consequently, like the very puppets that he holds, Fugui becomes another puppet in the communist authoritarian rule. His effort to uphold social standing ultimately contributes to the death of his son.

I was always hopeful for Li, and felt lucky that my son, out of all other promising students in Qindao, had been chosen to dance for Chairman Mao. Although the luck of the Cunxin family had changed, it was difficult to adjust to life in the commune without Li’s presence as a guiding light, or a helping hand. Having 7 sons while living our

The Sun of the Revolution by Liang Heng, is intriguing and vivid, and gives us a complex and compelling perspective on Chines culture during a confusing time period. We get the opportunity to learn the story of a young man with a promising future, but an unpleasant childhood. Liang Heng was exposed to every aspect of the Cultural Revolution in China, and shares his experiences with us, since the book is written from Liang perspective, we do not have a biased opinion from an elite member in the Chinese society nor the poor we get an honest opinion from the People’s Republic of China. Liang only had the fortunate opportunity of expressing these events due his relationship with his wife, An American woman whom helps him write the book. When

In the book, From Every End of the Earth by Steven Roberts (2009), there are many themes and topics that can be explored in the chapter 1. One theme that is continuously raised is that never give up even in big troubles. Everything began when Bao decided not to leave without Tuyen. He chose love instead of freedom. They met when they were teens but the accident happened. This is in stark description to the example he gives on p. 10 of the communists took Bao for reporting to a local high school. He was taken through the jungle with the inequity treat. But he did not give up. He thought about his wife and volunteered for harsh duty. He copied his personal story and wrote the same one again and again. Tuyen did not live well too. She lived with

Fugui first had the thought of taking his life when he lost his family fortune to gambling, driven to the edge of despair, “He wanted to hang himself [myself] with his [my] belt and be done with it.” (P28) However, Fugui did no implement this into action when he “realize [d] that he [I] had not the slightest inclination to take off his belt.”(p28) Life still had a meaning for Fugui at that point, taking away his own life was merely a way to “punish himself [myself]” (p28), he was confound and did not know the direction of life, the impulsion of taking away would only lead to more desire to live, the moment when life is eminent to death a human being would come into realization that life is precious. However fugui’s value of his life did lower due to the misfortune, as he sates: “When your life has been reduced to the level mine had, you really don't care all that much.” (p47) Fugui once was a man at the very top of