'You have to search yesterday'

 

“If you want to understand today, you have to search yesterday.” – Pearl Buck

 

Born in the backwoods of West Virginia on this date in 1892, Buck spent many of her “growing up years" in China where her parents were missionaries.   Over her lifetime she penned 40 novels, led by the massive best-selling The Good Earth, lauded for its compelling depiction of Chinese peasant life.    Over her 50-year writing career she also wrote numerous short stories and several nonfiction works, earning every major writing award capped by the 1938 Nobel Prize, becoming the first American woman to win the award. 

 

She also spoke and wrote against injustice whenever and wherever she saw it, and after winning the Nobel she utilized the prize money to establish the Pearl S. Buck Foundation to address humanitarian issues, especially in support of overcoming crushing poverty faced by children.  She saw the world unfolding around her and chronicled it in a writing style that melded the past and present with clarity and intensity. 

 

“In a mood of faith and hope my work goes on,” she said.  “A ream of paper lies on my desk waiting for the next book.  I am a writer and I take up my pen to write.”