Peasant Life in China
A Book Review of Life by Lu Yao
Reading Life, a novel by Lu Yao, I thought I was re-entering the world of Pearl Buck, except that it was China fifty years later. Life is the story of Gao Jialin, son of Gao Yude, a peasant farmer in the mountains of China. Even though the novel is set in the 1980s and the Communists have been in power for 30 years, it still feels very similar to the peasant world that Pearl Buck revealed to us in her books fifty years earlier.
As the son of a peasant farmer, Jialin has little hope for changing his future. He is destined to become a farmer like his father. Education is his only hope of escape. Jialin graduates from high school but fails to be admitted to college. He is given an opportunity to be a teacher and is able to leave his village for life in a small city.
His high hopes of moving on to better life are smashed after three years as a teacher. He is fired from his job and replaced by the son of a local leader. Returning to his home village, Jialin is depressed and does nothing with his life.
Qiaozhen, a local girl, is in love with Jialin and she pursues him when he returns to the village. She helps pull him out of his depression and to recover his dreams. She would do anything to make him happy. She lives for his success, not her own. Since she has not been to school, she…
