Rediscovering Pearl Buck

Having finished this weekend another novel by Pearl Buck, Peony, I've come to appreciate the author's observations about human nature. Her honesty stands out. Here her narrator comments about David, a young man who struggles with his feelings for the women he loves, including his mother and the family's bondmaid:

"He longed to be free of them all, and yet he knew that no man is ever free of the women who have made him what he is. He sighed and tossed and wished for the day when he could return to the shops and the men there who had nothing to do with his heart and his soul."

Here Ezra, David's father, reflects on the melancholy surrounding his Chinese Rabbi:

"He had chosen sorrow, the endless sorrow of a man haunted by God. He had even transmuted such sorrow into strange dark joy. He was most happy when he suffered most deeply, like the moth that flutters near the flame of the candle."

Finally, my favorite. On David's wedding day, the mothers of the bride and groom meet for the first time:

". . .each found the other strange and hard to talk with, and yet each was determined to do her best. . . [Madame Kung] granted that Madame Ezra tried very much to be pleasant to her, and although the day was tedious for these two ladies, somehow it passed." Emphasis mine. How many times have I been in situations where somehow the day passed?

Pearl Buck's voice is refreshing. Though her Chinese settings are exotic, the emotions of her characters are not. She's as relevant today as she was decades ago.

SOTU 2012

Tuesday night's SOTU speech showed an evolving Barack Obama. Gone was the inspirational rhetoric of the past--wonderful to listen to but rarely effective. That he sounded more like Bill Clinton, practical and partisan, is a sign of political maturity. Ditto his tone: no meanness towards his opponents, but no deference either.

Let the campaign begin. The president is ready, and the differences couldn't be clearer.

Southern Sensation

How did Newt Gingrich stage such a spectacular upset in South Carolina? What magic did he use? Hmm. . . he must have consulted the Bard.

From Macbeth (a great source of political wisdom)
Act IV, Scene i

1. WITCH
Round about the cauldron go;
In the poisoned entrails throw.
Mitt, who in New Hampshire won,
Must be stopped from having fun,
Bits of Bain I think we’ve got,
Boil these first i' th’ charmed pot.

ALL
Double, double, toil and trouble,
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

2. WITCH
Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the cauldron boil and bake;
Eye of Newt and vest of Rick,
Governor Perry’s running stick,
Callista’s hair and Tiffany jewels,
Liberals, elites and all those fools,
For a charm of pow’rful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

ALL
Double, double, toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

3. WITCH
Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,
Witch’s mummy, maw and gulf
Ron Paul’s grin and half a brow,
If he knew, he’d have a cow,
(Doctors don’t like witches’ brew,
Nor do Mormons, they might sue,)
Add the flag the Confederates flew,
At the State House, yes it’s true,
Don’t forget to pluck Mitt’s mettle,
For the ingredients in our kettle.

ALL
Double, double, toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Pining for the Past

Though I often find columnist David Brooks' cultural observations compelling, I rarely agree with his political arguments. Imagine my surprise, then, to read in this week's column, "I sometimes wonder if the Republican Party has become the receding roar of white America as it pines for a way of life that will never return."

He couldn't be more right in my view, though I sympathize sometimes with those howling Republicans--particularly when I compare the homogeneous, white classrooms of my childhood with the racially and economically diverse classrooms of my children. There's no doubt which of these settings is more challenging.

Yet on the same day that I read David Brooks, I skimmed through pages of John Hope Franklin's autobiography Mirror to America, and learned that while I was a child in one of those classrooms in the early 1960s, he--with his Harvard Ph.D. and professorship at Brooklyn College--was being denied bank loans in New York solely because of his race.

The America of the past may call to us, appealing to our wish for what's comfortable. But what's comfortable isn't necessarily better. Nor is it realistic or just.

Let the Republican Party roar and pine all it wants, applauding Newt and his racially charged innuendos. Theirs is a bitter and stingy America, one rooted in mist and mythology. The America of the present--and that of the future--demands more from us, and we must meet the challenge.

A Dog's Life: A Girl and Her Dog. . .

are friends forever.

Mitt's Sixth Deadly Sin

In his victory speech in New Hampshire on Tuesday night, Mitt Romney declared, "This country already has a leader who divides us with the bitter politics of envy. . .I stand ready to lead us down a different path, where we are lifted up by our desire to succeed, not dragged down by a resentment of success."

I have a feeling we'll hear more about the "politics of envy" in this campaign, for if envy is as Merriam-Webster defines it--"painful or resentful awareness of an advantage enjoyed by another joined with a desire to possess the same advantage"--then, yes, this is what this presidential campaign should be all about.

For evidently Governor Romney sees those of us who share less and less in the extraordinary wealth of this country as "resenting success." We apparently don't have the desire to succeed as he does. It's pretty easy, though, to succeed in America when your father was the head of American Motors.

It's not as easy to succeed when your father can't get you a job, when there's no job to be had, when you don't have heath insurance, and when your only safety net is rich relatives--and you don't have any.

President Obama has not sought to divide us along the lines of privilege. The lines already exist. The question before us now is which party is more likely to enact policies that benefit those most at risk and those who have suffered disproportionately from the extravagances of the last decades?

Surely not the party of Governor Romney.

Belize Part III: The Poverty

I don't have any pictures of the poverty we saw in Belize: the tiny shacks dotting the landscape as we drove to Mayan ruins or the pitted roads leading into Belize City. Nor do I have a recording of the voices of our tour guides, the desperation below the surface, pleading with us to return some day and to tell our friends of the "Unbelizable" time that we had in their country.

What I do have is a renewed sense of my place in the world. For while I simmer angrily with the rest of the 99% in my country, I realize--with a sense of deep unease--that I sit comfortably with the 1% that holds the world's wealth.

Belize Part II: The Colors

Though the animals in Belize were sometimes hard to spot, other life forms (both natural and otherwise) were not. We saw fronds dancing in the sand,



Holiday berries trimming a palm,



A broom sweeping jungle plants,



A beckoning pool,



Bags begging to be bought,



And a rainforest dressed in green.

Belize Part I: The Animals

A holiday cruise to ports of the western Caribbean landed our family for a day in Belize, where we toured the River Wallace (or Olde Belize River) by boat. Look closely to find the animals below:


Slicing the water with grace and ease, a dolphin swims beside us.


Along the trunk of this tree cling tiny bats, which devour mosquitoes in record numbers.


Black howler monkeys are found only in the rainforests of Belize, Guatemala, and southern Mexico. Their howls can be heard as far as three miles away, though they were silent when we saw them.


A study in gray, the heron--with its beautiful fringed feathers--glides over the water.


Green iguanas are not necessarily green. They are found everywhere in Belize--like squirrels at home--and are called "Bamboo Chickens."


The crocodile is as camouflaged as the others. You wouldn't think it necessary for such a fearsome creature to hide so well. Who is hiding from whom?