The Good Earth. by Buck, Pearl S - 1931

New York: The John Day Company, 1931. First edition, first issue with "flees" for "fleas" on page 100, line 17 of the author's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel and masterpiece. Octavo, original brown cloth, brown topstain. Near fine in the rare original dust jacket with some expert restoration. Though over eighty years have passed since this novel won the Pulitzer Prize, it has retained its popularity and become one of the great modern classics. "I can only write what I know, and I know nothing but China, having always lived there," wrote Pearl Buck. In The Good Earth she presents a graphic view of a China when the last emperor reigned and the vast political and social upheavals of the twentieth century were but distant rumblings for the ordinary people. This moving, classic story of the honest farmer Wang Lung and his selfless wife O-lan is must reading for those who want to fully appreciate the sweeping changes that have occurred in the lives of the Chinese people during this century.