Dharmabum’s Reviews > The Good Earth > Status Update

Thus, thinking heavily, he went on alone and he said to himself, "There in that land of mine is buried the first good half of my life and more. It is as though half of me were buried there, and now it is a different life in my house."
And suddenly, he wept a little, and he dried his eyes with the back of his hand, as a child does.

"Aye, beaten or carried to a man's bed, as the whim was, and not to one man's only but to any that might desire her that night, and the young lords bickered and bartered with each other for this slave or that and said, 'Then if you tonight, I tomorrow.' and when they were all alike wearied of a slave the men servants bickered and bartered for what the young lords left, and this before a slave was out of childhood.."

At night he knew that he drew men to big tea houses & to places of pleasure...But none of the pleasures did Wang Lung know for himself, since his feet crossed no threshold except that of his own hut, & his road was always ended at a gate. He lived in the rich city as alien as a rat in a rich man's house that is fed on scraps thrown away, & hides here & there & is never a part of the real life of the house.

At night he knew that he drew men to big tea houses & to places of pleasure...But none of the pleasures did Wang Lung know for himself, since his feet crossed no threshold except that of his own hut, & his road was always ended at a gate. He lived in the rich city as alien as a rat in a rich man's house that is fed on scraps thrown away, & hides here & there & is never a part of the real life of the house.

Her eyes were small and of a dull black in colour, and were filled with some kind of sadness that was not clearly expressed. It was a face that seemed habitually silent and unspeaking, as though it could not speak if it could. She bore patiently Wang Lung's look, without embarrassment or response, simply waiting until he had seen her.