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Pearl S. Buck
PEARL S. BUCK (1892-1973) - (aka John Sedges) American author noted for her novels of life in China.
Pearl Sydenstricker Buck was born in 1892 in Hillsboro, West Virginia, and raised in eastern
China by her Presbyterian missionary family. Her father was so dedicated that the family lived with,
and dressed like, the local peasants and Pearl Buck learned to speak Chinese before English.
She graduated with honors from Randolph-Macon Women’s College in Lynchburg, VA in 1914 and shortly
thereafter returned to China to care for her ailing mother. There she met John Lossing Buck,
an American agricultural missionary, whom she married in 1917. Although she was later divorced
and remarried, she retained the name Buck professionally.
In 1922, Buck began writing articles and short stories about China for U.S. magazines and in
1930 her first novel was published. The publication of her next novel, The Good Earth,
transformed her life. Heading the best-seller lists for months, The Good Earth sold nearly
two million copies, was translated into more than thirty languages, inspired a 1932 Broadway play,
and won the 1932 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. In 1937, it was made into a movie, as would
be several of her later novels.
During the 1930’s, her marriage deteriorated, primarily because of her increasing fame and her
involvement with her publisher, Richard Walsh, who she married in 1935, and she returned permanently
to live in the United States. In 1938, Buck became the first American woman to win the
Nobel Prize for literature, awarded for her earlier portrayals of China and for her
biographies of her parents.
When the U.S. entered World War II, Buck devoted energy to supporting United China Relief, providing
data for servicemen's Asian guidebooks, and writing radio scripts for broadcast in China. She also
tried to impart knowledge of Asia through the East and West Association, which she founded
in 1941 to bring Asian cultural figures to the United States. She also directed the publication
of Asia magazine from 1941 to 1946. After the war, in a move to aid illegitimate children
of U.S. servicemen in Asian countries, she instituted the Pearl S. Buck Foundation
(now Pearl S. Buck International).
Between 1945 and 1953, she also wrote five novels set on the American frontier under the
pseudonym John Sedges. The first of these works, The Townsman, won both popular and scholarly
acclaim for its accurate depiction of Kansas in the 1850's.
For the remainder of her life she continued to be a prolific writer and raised nine adopted
children from various racial backgrounds. She continued to write about China, interracial marriages,
historical novels, short stories, children’s books, non-fiction, and three works of autobiography.
The majority of her papers, letters, and manuscripts are housed at the Pearl S. Foundation
International, based near Philadelphia, PA. A large collection of translations of her works are
housed at Princeton University, as well as letters and legal documents from the period 1928-1950’s,
when the David Lloyd Literary Agency was her agent.
Books by Pearl S. Buck
NOVELS:
◊East Wind: West Wind (1930)
◊The Good Earth (1931)
◊Sons (1932)
◊The Mother (1934)
◊A House Divided (1935)
◊House of Earth (1935)
◊This Proud Heart (1938)
◊The Patriot (1939)
◊Other Gods: An American Legend (1940)
◊China Sky (1942)
◊Dragon Seed (1942)
◊The Promise (1943)
◊The Story of Dragon Seed (1944)
◊China Flight (1945)
◊Portrait of a Marriage (1945)
◊Pavilion of Women (1946)
◊Peony (1948); published in the UK as The Bondmaid (1949)
◊Kin Folk (1949)
◊God's Men (1951)
◊The Hidden Flower (1952)
◊Satan Never Sleeps (1952)
◊Come, My Beloved (1953)
◊Imperial Woman (1956)
◊Letter from Peking (1957)
◊Command the Morning (1959)
◊The Living Reed (1963)
◊Death in the Castle (1965)
◊The Time Is Noon (1967)
◊The New Year (1968)
◊The Three Daughters of Madame Liang (1969)
◊Mandala (1970)
◊The Goddess Abides (1972)
◊All under Heaven (1973)
◊The Rainbow (1974)
SHORT STORIES:
◊The First Wife and Other Stories (1933)
◊Today and Forever: Stories of China (1941)
◊Twenty-Seven Stories (1943)
◊Far and Near: Stories of Japan, China, and America (1947); published in the UK as Far and Near: Stories of East and West (1949)
◊Fourteen Stories (1961); published in the UK as With a Delicate Air and Other Stories (1962)
◊Hearts Come Home and Other Stories (1962)
◊Stories of China (1964)
◊Escape at Midnight and Other Stories (1964)
◊The Good Deed and Other Stories of Asia, Past and Present (1969)
◊Once upon a Christmas (1972)
◊East and West: Stories (1975)
◊Secrets of the Heart: Stories (1976)
◊The Lovers and Other Stories (1977)
◊Mrs Stoner and the Sea and Other Stories (1978)
◊The Woman Who Was Changed and Other Stories (1979)
CHILDREN'S STORIES:
◊The Young Revolutionist (1932)
◊Stories for Little Children (1940)
◊When Fun Begins (1941)
◊The Chinese Children Next Door (1942)
◊The Water Buffalo Children (1943)
◊Yu Lan: Flying Boy of China (1945)
◊The Big Wave (1948)
◊One Bright Day (1950); published in the UK as One Bright Day and Other Stories for Children (1952)
◊The Man Who Changed China: The Story of Sun Yat Sen (1953)
◊The Beech Tree (1954)
◊Johnny Jack and His Beginnings (1954)
◊Christmas Miniature (1957); published in the UK as The Christmas Mouse (1958)
◊The Christmas Ghost (1960)
◊Welcome Child (1964)
◊The Big Fight (1965)
◊The Little Fox in the Middle (1966)
◊Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John (1967)
◊The Chinese Storyteller (1971)
◊A Gift for the Children (1973)
◊Mrs Starling's Problem (1973)
NONFICTION:
◊Is There a Case for Foreign Missions? (1932) pamphlet
◊East and West and the Novel: Sources of the Early Chinese Novel (1932)
◊The Spirit and the Flesh (1944)
◊The Exile (1936) - biography of author's mother
◊Fighting Angel: Portrait of a Soul (1936) biography of author's father
◊The Chinese Novel (1939)
◊Of Men and Women (1941)
◊American Unity and Asia (1942); published in the UK as Asia and Democracy (1943)
◊What America Means to Me (1943)
◊Tell the People: Mass Education in China (1945)
◊The Child Who Never Grew (1950)
◊My Several Worlds: A Personal Record (1954) autobiography
◊The Delights of Learning (1960)
◊A Bridge for Passing (1962) - autobiography
◊The Joy of Children (1964)
◊The Gifts They Bring: Our Debts to the Mentally Retarded (1965)
◊Children for Adoption (1965)
◊The People of Japan (1966)
◊For Spacious Skies: Journey in Dialogue (1966)
◊To My Daughters, With Love (1967)
◊The People of China (1968)
◊The Kennedy Women: A Personal Appraisal (1970)
◊The Story Bible (1971)
◊Pearl S. Buck's America (1971)
◊China Past and Present (1972)
◊A Community Success Story: The Founding of the Pearl Buck Center (1972)
◊Oriental Cookbook (1972)
NOVELS Written as JOHN SEDGES:
◊The Dragon Fish (1944) children's story
◊The Townsman (1945)
◊The Angry Wife (1947)
◊The Long Love (1949)
◊Bright Procession (1952)
◊Voices in the House (1953)
◊American Triptych: Three `John Sedges' Novels (1958)
WORKS About PEARL S. BUCK:
◊Conn, Peter J. (1996). Pearl S. Buck: A Cultural Biography
◊Harris, Theodore F. (1969-1971). Pearl S. Buck: A Biography, 2 volumes
◊Sherk, Warren (1992). Pearl S. Buck: Good Earth Mother
◊Spencer, Cornelia (1944). The Exile's Daughter: A Biography of Pearl S. Buck
◊Stirling, Nora (1983). Pearl Buck: A Woman in Conflict
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