A Critical Review onThe Good Earth and its Chinese Version

Li Jing

【Abstract】This article offers a critical review of the existing evaluation of The Good Earth， both its English original and the Chinese translation， through which the reception of the novel is examined. It is found that， due to its uniqueness in themes and description in details， the worldwide correlational research in literature has gone through three periods： the chaos in the early period， the negative criticism in the middle period and the relative prosperity in the nowadays. However， there are still insufficient reviews of the Chinese version， concerning the translation quality， translation style as well as the specific cultural factors.

【Key words】The Good Earth； Chinese Translation； Controversy； Reception

1. Introduction

After its first publication in1931， The Good Earth became one of the best sellers in America in the next two years and was translated into 145 languages during the following years. Its overwhelming popularity brought the author Pearl S. Buck great fame and fortune immediately. With a multi-cultural background， Pearl S. Buck used her personal experience as a firsthand material to build a basic setting for The Good Earth in order to show the western readers the real China in her eyes. Its the very first time that the Chinese people were considered to enjoy the equality and respect shared by the westerners instead of being demonized as cartoon “Orientals”.

2. Previous Studies on The Good Earth

For its uniqueness in themes and description in details， The Good Earth， a masterpiece ahead of its time， has triggered a series of academic discussion both at home and abroad. Influenced by the changing international politics， the worldwide correlational research of The Good Earth has gone through three different periods： the chaos in the early period， the negative criticism in the middle period and the relative prosperity in the nowadays.

2.1 Previous Studies Abroad

Instead of offering a positive assessment， the western literary circles tended to belittle and even ignore Bucks achievement and the literature value of her works. So far， there have been limited researches in the western academia since 1930s. More often than not， the studies on The Good Earth and its follow-up works in the early days are usually found to be biographies or book reviews based on scholars personal opinions.

Among the few studies， Pearl S. Buck： A Cultural Biography（1997）written by Peter Conn is worldly recognized as the best and most influential biography about Bucks life experience for its straightforward prose and balanced assessment of her accomplishments as well as a detailed description of Bucks life experience， covering her early childhood in China， first marriage， success in career， participation in civil-rights and feminist movement as well as her social contacts with some Chinese writers. However， even though Conn did a lot of work on the collection and organization of materials about Bucks early life， he seldom show his own attitude or give any personal judgments about Bucks cross-cultural perspective or her cultural stand instead he chooses to used others comments to express his opinion. Based on a deep analysis on Conns work， Buck （1997） points out Conns shortcomings in criticism and gives a complementary description of Pearl S. Bucks second husband and also her long-term publisher Richard Walsh for Conns omission in the book.

In his doctoral dissertation， Liao （1997） analyzes Bucks works in a cross-cultural perspective within the help of a series of relative comments made about her cultural identity and her multi-cultural background. The significance of this dissertation partly comes from its detailed description about the historical background at Bucks time and largely lies in its deep analysis on the sociological values of her majors works especially The Good Earth. Besides above works， the international centennial symposium， held at Bucks alma mater—Randolph-Macon Womens College， should also be noticed. In this symposium， dozens of scholars made their speeches and pointed out that American studies on Pearl S. Buck should be considered as a major part of the studies about Sino-America relationship. All the presented speeches were collected and officially published by Lipscomb with a title The Several World of Pearl S. Buck in the same year.

2.2 Previous Studies at Home

Compared with its mild echo in the western literature， The Good Earth gains more attention in the Chinese literary circle and its unique cultural conception also attracts scholars great interest. Bucks multi-cultural background and unique cultural stand are combined together which sparked controversy in the domestic research. Due to historical and political influence， Pearl S. Buck and her works have gone through several significant setbacks.

2.2.1 The Controversy in the Early Period

From 1930s to 1940s， a huge academic upsurge of studies on Buck and her major works had arisen in the Chinese academia and， meanwhile， The Good Earth had been translated into 6 versions， whose prefaces has seen as the beginning of the domestic studies in this field. With a huge upsurge in the relative studies， a controversy arouse among Chinese scholars.

In a book review of The Good Earth（郭英劍，1999）， Ye Gongchao describes this work as an epic and highly commends the efforts made by Buck in her detailed and faithful description of Chinese peasants. He speaks highly of Bucks achievement in literature and believed Buck could fully understand Chinese peoples thoughts and emotions instead of indulging into her own Fantasies. Zhuang Xinzai（莊心在，1933）once made his own comments in his article Ms. Buck and Her Works. He believed it was the difference in races， traditions， languages and geographical features between China and the west made people of different cultural backgrounds failed to have a mutual understanding which directly lead to westerners prejudice and misconception against the Chinese people. Under such circumstances， the publication of The Good Earth is， in fact， a turning point for cultural blending. Zhuang believed Buck “is willing to describe a real China and detail its actual condition in a sincere manner” and for that reason she “should be treated as the bosom friend of our nation” （莊心在，1933：82）.

However， there were still plenty of critics who held an opposite view by taking Bucks major works as an expression of her white womans superiority and an exaggeration of local Chinese customs that could never reflect real Chinese conditions to the western world. In A Chinese scholars interpretation of Pearl S. Bucks Works in New York Times， Jiang Kanghu（江亢虎，1933）believed that Bucks childhood played an important role in shaping her personality and stories told by her amah， a pauper who has “a strange concept of life” and “an obvious shortage in their education”， became the sketches in her latter writings（江亢虎，1933）. In To Yao Ke（《致姚克》）， Lu Xun（魯迅，1933）held that “although Pearl S. Buck was quite popular in Shanghai for a long time and personally regarded China as her motherland”， “she still held her fathers Christian missionary values in her works” and “only we， the real Chinese， could describe our nation faithfully”（魯迅，1933：272-273）.

2.2.2 The Silence in the Middle Period

For political and historical reasons， the relative studies on Buck and her major works had trapped into stagnation. Under the political pressure from the center government， the books were officially banned and the studies were also suspended.

2.2.3 The Prosperity in the Recent Years

Since the 1980s， the relative studies on Pearl S. Buck and her major works had resumed for the stagnation and developed into a prosperous stage.

In The Good Earth： A Sublimation of Local Color Literature Chen Chunsheng（陳春生，1995） made a series of horizontal comparisons between Buck and Lu Xun of their distinctive cultural stand and believed that even under a strong influence of the western culture especially by the doctrine of Christianity， Bucks cross-cultural background still enable her to create such a masterpiece struck a chord among people of different walks and nationalities and endowed it with a global significance（陳春生，1995：66）.In the Chinese Story American Sprit — an Analysis of Pearl S. Bucks Cultural Stand， Li Lihua（李麗華，2012） said that Bucks conflictive cultural stand， defined by her life in China and her American identity， resulted in the fact that Buck spent her whole life on becoming a real American. Comparing the novel with its film edition， Wang Yukuo（王玉括，2003） investigated differences of Buck and her contemporaries cultural attitudes and concludes that Buck has combined the traditional Chinese Confucianism and the western values into her writings.

Zhou Min（周敏，2011） posed her opinion that Buck， a cultural mixed-blood， was trying to remodel Chinese female characters with some modern characteristics in order to let the world see their precious virtues such as kindness， bravery and purposefulness. Zhu Xixiang（朱希祥，2003）used ground， rock and soil to describe three major male characters separately and gave out his understanding about The Good Earth as follows： “men and women are born to be together for achieving a full prosperity of world and human society”（朱希祥，2003：72）. According to them， The Good Earth could be seen as “a mixed-blood of two cultures” instead of outsiders prejudice.

3. Previous Studies on Translation of The Good Earth

Compared with the upsurge of researching in the Good Earth， the studies on the translation of Bucks major works are seldom made. In his MA thesis， Xia Lingshi（夏令時，2012）made a comparative study on differences of the ideology， attitude of the translator， fusion between two languages and cultural filtering as well as the translators subjectivity among the three different Chinese versions of The Good Earth from the perspective of Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics. Using Verschuerens Adaptation Theory as the theoretical foundation， Sang Wei（桑薇，2013）made a detailed analysis of the translation process of Wang Fengzhens Chinese version Da Di（The Good Earth）.

4. Summary

In the previous studies both at home and abroad， scholars tended to pay much more attention to the literature value of The Good Earth than to its Chinese translation. Among those few studies on its Chinese translation， scholars seldom focus on the back-translation of the Chinese culture originally translated into English in the Chinese version of The Good Earth. Consequently， translators subjectivity， cultural background， political scene and other essential factors havent been fully analyzed in the previous studies， whether quantitatively or qualitatively. For that reason， it could possibly be quite a new perspective to probe into the back-translation of the Chinese cultural factors originally translated into English in the Chinese version of The Good Earth from the perspective of post-colonial translation theory. From this point， there's still a lot of room for us to do and so much more we can do.

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作者簡介：李菁（1991.7-），女，浙江杭州人，浙江財經大學2014級碩士研究生，主要研究方向為翻譯理論與實踐。