The Good Earth

how dose o-lan show strength of character with three exmamples from the book

Good earth

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O'lan gives the pearls she cherishes back to her husband; they will be gifted to another woman.

"Then slowly she thrust her wet wrinkled hand into her bosom and she drew forth the small package and she gave it to him and watched him as he unwrapped it; and the pearls lay in his hand and they caught softly and fully the light of the sun, and he laughed. But O-lan returned to the beating of his clothes and when tears dropped slowly and heavily from her eyes she did not put up her hand to wiped them away; only she beat the more steadily with her wooden stick upon the clothes spread over the stone." (Chapter 19)

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O'lan kills her newborn daughter during the famine. She knows they cannot feed nor care for her.

'What agony of starvation this woman had endured, with the starved creature gnawing at her from within, desperate for its own life."

"The round head dropped this way and that and upon the necy he saw two dark, bruised spots, but he (Wang Lung) finished what he had to do."

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O'lan killed the ox to keep her family from starving because Wang Lung could not.

"Then O'lan crept out and took a great orin knife she had in the kitchen and she cut a great gash in the beast's neck, and thus she severed its life. And she took a bowl and caught its blood to cook for them to eat in a pudding, and she skinned and hacked to pieces the great carcass..."

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The Good Earth

O'lan gives the pearls she cherishes back to her husband; they will be gifted to another woman.

"Then slowly she thrust her wet wrinkled hand into her bosom and she drew forth the small package and she gave it to him and watched him as he unwrapped it; and the pearls lay in his hand and they caught softly and fully the light of the sun, and he laughed. But O-lan returned to the beating of his clothes and when tears dropped slowly and heavily from her eyes she did not put up her hand to wiped them away; only she beat the more steadily with her wooden stick upon the clothes spread over the stone." (Chapter 19)

_______________________________________________________________

O'lan kills her newborn daughter during the famine. She knows they cannot feed nor care for her.

'What agony of starvation this woman had endured, with the starved creature gnawing at her from within, desperate for its own life."

"The round head dropped this way and that and upon the necy he saw two dark, bruised spots, but he (Wang Lung) finished what he had to do."

________________________________________________________________

O'lan killed the ox to keep her family from starving because Wang Lung could not.

"Then O'lan crept out and took a great orin knife she had in the kitchen and she cut a great gash in the beast's neck, and thus she severed its life. And she took a bowl and caught its blood to cook for them to eat in a pudding, and she skinned and hacked to pieces the great carcass..."