From the epilogue of the book, Living Reed concocted by Pearl S. Buck:
"It was high noon at Pusan, on a fine autumn day, two years ago. I had traveled the length and breadth of South Korea, by motorcar, so that I could stopped when I liked. The road was often narrow and rough, the bridges over the many brooks, bombed during the war, had not yet been rebuilt, and we rattled over dry stones or splashed through water made shallow by the dry season."
I relished the descriptions in this intro. It paints a picture in my mind. When a writer can make me imagine something so vivid, I know that they are really good. Pearl, in first person, has recounted for us in this epilogue her visit to Korea after the Korean War. The Korean War took place five years after World War II, in which we fought against Germany and Japan. However in the Korean War, America fought alongside Japan and South Korea against the Russian North Korea. Interesting. I thought that this was a very profound book, and recommend it highly.
PS: The green words are the vocabulary from September or October.
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Grant, have you read any works by Chaim Potok? His most well-known is The Chosen, and most of his books take place in orthodox Jewish communities in New York. But he wrote one, I am the Clay, that reflects his service as a Jewish chaplain in the U.S. Army during the Korean war. Might be interesting to you.
ReplyDeleteIn your sentence that begins "When a writer...," I would avoid using "they" as a singular pronoun. It's "a writer," so go ahead and use "she," since you are talking about a specific woman. One more thought: When you use "however," consider placing it farther into the sentence instead of first. So you might say, "In the Korean War, however, America fought...." The interesting fact you noted had to do with the Cold War shift of alliances.