Susan Xu

Advanced English
Dr. Joel Brown
March 30th 
Life Satisfaction in The Good Earth ---- a personality analysis of the protagonist
Wang Lung

     In the novel The Good Earth, the author paints a vivid scene of the life of Wang
Lung, a stereotyped farmer in traditional Chinese society who achieved a relatively
high social status by his own hands. Wang Lung is depicted as a laborious worker
who is affinitive to his land and he showed an extremely positive attitude toward life
and the earth. It seems that he became more satisfied with his life circumstances as his
social status changed. However, the effect of personality is always overlooked. Recent
psychological studies tend to relate life satisfaction levels with big five characteristics.
“Personality differences antedate and predict differences in happiness over a period of
10 years.”("Sci-Hub | Influence of Extraversion and Neuroticism on Subjective Well-
being: Happy and Unhappy People. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology,
38(4), 668–678 | 10.1037/0022-3514.38.4.668", 1) In other words, in Pearl
Buck’s The Good Earth, Wang Lung developed a high satisfaction in his life due to
his personality features.

      A study in 1997 revealed the strong association between extraversion and high
level of life satisfaction. “The significant effects of Extroversion on both self-esteem
and relationship harmony suggest that characteristics such as energy, optimism, and
sociability are beneficial for pursuing both intrapsychic and interpersonal goals and
thus for enhancing life satisfaction through two mediators.”("Sci-Hub | Influence of
Extraversion and Neuroticism on Subjective Well-being: Happy and Unhappy People.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 38(4), 668–678 | 10.1037/0022-
3514.38.4.668", 7) In The Good Earth, Wang Lung can be described as an extravert.
He is willing to overcome the difficulties he encountered, even when natural disaster
came. Compared with Ching, Wang Lung tried to change his life when the drought
came to his land, that he led his family to the South for a better life. “Now Ching was
a fearful and timid man and however bad the times were he did not dare as Wang
Lung did to exclaim against Heaven. He only said 'Heaven wills it,' and he accepted
flood and drought with meekness. Not so Wang Lung" (Pearl, 157) 

Also, Wang Lung cared about public opinions on him that he didn’t want others to
consider him as a farmer when he became rich. He tried to behave like rich people
and started to buy expensive stuff even though he didn’t need them. This is a huge
change since he tried hard to hide his money and was keeping afraid of people would
know that he had some money when he was not that rich. At this point, extraversion is
describe as public opinion driven, that is, all his behaviors are caused by how people
may react to them, and he pays the most attention to the external world instead of
himself.
However, Wang Lung cut off all his connections to the external world when he
became old. He kept himself in his room, only hardly talked with his sons, and he
even stops going to his land. This explains why the ending of the story is tragic and
the tone is somehow heavy.

From another perspective, Neuroticism is believed to be negatively associated with

high satisfaction of life. (Rr and Jr, 1) According, to The Good Earth, Wang Lung
showed opposite characteristics to Neuroticism. Individuals who score high on
Neuroticism always have trouble controlling urges and delaying gratification. Instead,
Wang Lung always trained his body and devote himself to work. “He would like to
have slept, now that he could, but his foolish body, which he had made to arise every
morning so early for all these years, would not sleep although it could, and so he lay
there, tasting and savoring in his mind and in his flesh his luxury of idleness”(Pearl,
17) However, his desire became uncontrollable when Lotus appeared. And the
appearance of Lotus, as a tipping point in the plot, implies that the life of Wang Lung,
or the whole family, was starting to corrupt.

Moreover, while neurotics respond more poorly to stressors, Wang Lung established a
calm and positive attitude as the lord of the family. In the South, he refused to beg on
the street and tried to earn money in his way. In a completely strange city, he started
his own business began with nothing. Although his family members are in extremely
starvation and his daughter became near death, he could still make rational decisions
to went back to his land. Furthermore, when the flood came, he was not nervous at all
that he knew that he had enough food and things would be better than the flood would
soon disappear. 

In contrast, some may argue that it is the social status that leads these psychological
changes and Wang Lung’s attitude and behaviors are determined by society or culture.
This argument can find its roots in Wang Lung’s change of behavior patterns when he
got more money. However, personality should be considered as the foundation of all
these changes. Social status indeed influences people’s opinion toward the different
class of the society, but it is Wang Lung’s extraverted and non-neurotic characteristics
that made him achieve a higher social status. The external world and internal world,
or cultural and individual’s opinion, are two factors that continuously shaping each
other. More importantly, the reason why Wang Lung is successful is that he is
somehow beyond the culture, that is, fight for his life instead of accepting it passively.

In conclusion, in Pearl Buck’s The Good Earth, the protagonist Wang Lung achieved
different levels of life satisfaction during his life due to his personality changes. In
most parts of his life, he showed a laborious, extraverted and calm figure and
achieved a higher social status through his hard work.
Bibliography
1. Pearl, Buck. The Good Earth.
2. "Sci-Hub | Influence of Extraversion and Neuroticism on Subjective Well-being:
Happy and Unhappy People. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 38(4),
668–678 | 10.1037/0022-3514.38.4.668." n.d., www.sci-hub.tw/10.1037//0022-
3514.38.4.668.
3. Rr, M., and C. P. Jr. "Validation of the Five-factor Model of Personality Across
Instruments and Observers. - PubMed - NCBI." n.d.,
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3820081.