读书笔记
读书心得
I read the article “ALIVE AGAIN”, written by Pearl. S.Buck.
It tells a story of 87 years old lady,she made a lot of money when was young. At the age of 75, she fell in love with dancing and spent a lot of money on dancing lessons. She was sued by her daughter and be thought was a senile. She moved into a nursing home and was given money weekly by daughter. The male teacher who taught her dancing lost his job due to scandal. 12 years later, she found the male teacher with the help of the nurse. She used her accumulation to help him open an inn. She felt young and alive again.
1）(A) Ellie Jason, a new nurse, took care of Mrs. Lettie Gainesworth at the Retirement Home. She told Miss March, the supervisor of nurses: “ Mrs. Gainesworth is just very sad about something.” “Sad indeed!”, Miss March said sharply. “ Twelve years not going out of that room. She’s making herself sad. And her with all that money— it gives me the creeps.”
Ellie insisted : “we must try to understand .”
Miss March reported : “They’re just old people waiting to die. She has a beautiful house and a married daughter who wants her to live with them.”
Ellie took the breakfast tray to Mrs. Gainesworth’s room. Mrs. Gainesworth said:” Ellie, I don’t feel hungry. I’ll be eighty- seven next Monday. How long does this life continue? Will you buy me some books at the Village Bookshop?”
At Ellie’s mid morning break she rushed to the book shop, and asked for the book buyer’s guide.
The bookseller muttered: “ Is that senile old fool still around?”
Ellie retorted: “ what do you know about her that gives you the right to speak so of her?”
The man said: “ It was in all the papers. About fifteen years ago, she went to a dance studio and got mixed up with one gigolo and spent a fortune on dancing lessons—thirty thousand dollars.
Ellie demanded: “ Did she inherit it in trust for her children?”
The man admitted: “ No, that was hers, lady Gaines Cosmetics was the business woman. None of her own children. They adopted a girl, she married. Her kids took her into court said she was incompetent, spending all money on dancing. Made a big stink in the paper. The dance studio had to shut up.”
Ellie had not realized that Lady Gaines was her Mrs. Gainesworth. Somehow she must hear Mrs.Gainesworth tell her own story.
Ellie gave her the book and asked: “ Did you enjoy your dancing lessons, Mrs. Gainesworth?” Mrs. Gainesworth said firmly: “ No one knows the truth. They called me a senile old fool. I did what I want to do with my own money. I was just bored. One day, I heard a radio announcement dancing being good exercise for old people. I made an appointment for that. The manager, Bill Poltergeist, greeted me. I bought a few lessons. Expensive, of course, twenty dollars an hour. I didn’t tell my daughter about that, it was my money. I went every other day for about six months. Then I heard about a dancing Olympic, so I bought a hundred more lessons and went everyday. Bill Polter was a wonderful teacher. I came in first in the competition. I was never bored. The newspapers were always writing something about me. My daughter didn’t approve of my dancing, but I didn’t care. It was my life- and my money. But I never dreamed they’d do what they did. My daughter had hired a private detective to find out how much money I was spending. When the detective told her that I had spent thirty thousand dollars on dancing, she got a lawyer and took me to court . The newspapers called Bill ‘ the thirty thousand dollar lover boy!’ I was declared ‘ mentally incompetent.’
I went to my own attorney, my daughter and her husband had to pay my expenses wherever I live and give me twenty-five dollars a week for spending money. I adopted that girl out of a poor orphanage when she was only a few weeks old years. Poor Bill. They ran him out of the town. I’ll make up it to him. I haven’t spent a dime in the twelve years, I have fifteen thousand dollars, it’s all been invested in Lady Gaines stock. I’ve put it all in trust for Bill Polter. He can make a fresh start some day.”
“ It’s a horrible story,” Ellie said. “ And I wish I could help you.”
(B) Ellie thought, she must help Mrs. Gainesworth to get back into life where she belonged.
Tomorrow morning, Mrs.Gainesworth said to her: “ Ellie, look at this newspaper.” Ellie read the headline: “ Thirty Thousand Dollar Lover Boy Handles Public Funds.” “Rodney Benson, whose real name is Bill Polter.” Ellie continued reading: “He was head of a fund drive. A member of of the Board had hired a detective agency to investigate and they had unearthed the story. Rodney Bodley resigned his job.”
The old lady snapped: “ I want you to buy me all the other newspapers.I’m going to tell the head nurse I need a full-time nurse-that’s you.”
The old lady glanced at one paper after the other. “ Ah, here it is-Rodney Benson lives at Cornell Towers. Go to the phone and call him. Go, find him, Ellen, and bring him back.”
Ellie told her: “ He wouldn’t come. He says he doesn’t want to get you into more trouble.”
“Well, I’ll just have to go to him. I’ll be ready at tomorrow morning.”
When Ellie entered the room next morning she was startled.Ellie said: “ you are really a very beautiful woman. Are you in love with him. Mrs. Gainesworth?”
“ No. I do love him, of course, but I’m not in love with him.”
Mrs. Gainesworth’s spirits rose higher as the miles slipped by .Rodney Benson came to the door at the sound of the car.“Lady Gaines, how are you?” He kissed her. “ You shouldn’t have come, I’ve caused you enough trouble.”
“It was I who have hurt you, Bill. Well, we must capitalize on it. We’ll make a fortune on all this publicity. People will come just to see us. I must do something.”
Ellie said: “ You can, Mrs. Gainesworth. All the money you’ve saved the last twelve years.”
Bill interrupted: “ I don’t want your money, Mrs. Gaines!”
“ Bill, don’t be proud,” Ellie said. “ She’s saved it for you and it’s been her only pleasure.”
Mrs. Gainesworth said: “ Bill, you made everyone have such a good time in the studio. Why can’t we do something like that? Perhaps an inn, we could make a success of one place and then another— Lady Gaines and Bill Polter.”
“Why not?” Bill demanded.
“ It’s done,” Mrs. Gainesworth decided. “ I’m twelve years younger!”
(C) Six months later, finally a house to accept to become a part of their lives. It was an old inn with a vast porch.“Now, Bill,” Mrs. Gainesworth had commanded, “ This is another beginning and we’ll keep on.”
That night, now a month ago, Mrs. Gainesworth danced just as she always had wanted to do. Bill caught sight of her, sitting in a high- backed chair that made her look like a queen. “ Will you open the dance with me, Lady Gaines?” he asked.
“ Let Ellie take my place tonight, Bill— she looks so pretty.”
Bill laughed: “ You’re right. She is the prettiest girl.”
“ I’m alive again,”Mrs. Gainesworth thought. “I’m alive.”
2) I think: (A) This is a woman with ideals and passion. Under the pressure of public opinion, when her daughter sued her in court, people with weak willpower may commit suicide, but she is not depressed, but thinking about how to overcome difficulties. She succeeded.
(B) It is very bad for some newspapers to report some untrue news for the sake of sensationalism.
Adapted from Pearl S. Buck: A Cultural Biography by Peter Conn
(Cambridge University Press, 1996)
? In 1963, Ted Harris, an Arthur Murray dance instructor, was hired by Pearl Buck to teach her three youngest daughters. After only a few weeks, Pearl decided that she, too, would take lessons with him. This “casual encounter developed into a troubled but intense and lasting relationship. Ted…became Pearl’s escort, advisor, employee, collaborator, and co-author…. until the day Pearl died ten years later, they spent most of their time together…. Their association would lead to “the greatest scandal of her life” (Conn, 352).
? By the time Pearl met him he had changed his name from Fred Hair, Jr., to Theodore Findley Harris. A high school dropout from South Carolina, he had no assets but charm and ambition, says Conn, and devoted himself to cultivating Pearl . (353)
? At the time of Ted’s arrival, Pearl was devising a plan to provide aid to Amerasian children in Korea and other Asian nations. When she presented her proposal to the Welcome House Board, she recommended that Ted be appointed administrator. They refused to accept him as director of the project, saying he had no proper qualifications. When Pearl received the Gimbel Award for her humanitarian work in January 1964, she announced that the check of $1000 would go to the funding of a new organization, the Pearl S. Buck Foundation, which she incorporated in February of the same year with three officers. Ted would serve as president, Pearl as chairperson, and a local lawyer who had worked for Arthur Murray as legal counsel . (354-355)
? She next bought an expensive townhouse on Delancey Place in Philadelphia to serve as headquarters of the new organization, furnished it, leased several cars, and put Ted and several of his friends on the payroll. She and Ted then made a national tour, a series of gala balls, to raise funds to help the Amerasian children. But the tour just about broke even, and months passed before any money reached the children.
? As time passed, Pearl’s time was taken up by Ted and the foundation and there was little room for her other activities. She began to withdraw from long-term connections and commitments.
? David Burpee, a longtime friend of Pearl and member of the Welcome House board agreed to join the board of the new foundation but left after only one meeting. He felt that the organization was too heavily influenced by “Arthur Murray people” and that there had been “financial irregularities” (356). Pearl defended Ted in a letter to Burpee.
? Conn says that an examination of the foundation’s “initial expenditures” revealed that too much money was being spent on Ted and the headquarters on Delancey Place and that little was being sent to Korea. (357)
? In 1967, Pearl announced that she was bequeathing her entire estate to the Pearl S. Buck Foundation, leaving only small bequests to her children. After her death, all royalties would go to the foundation, including Ted’s salary, which he would collect for the rest of his life. (362)
? Rumors began to spread about Ted: alleged abuse of young Amerasian boys brought to the foundation from Korea; “financial shenanigans,” including Ted’s sale of a car that had been leased to the foundation; drug smuggling. (362) The latter brought on an FBI investigation. The report was leaked to the local press, but when the source of the leak could not be identified, Hoover closed the case. (363)
? More rumors arose in 1969 when the children housed at the Opportunity Center in Sosa, Korea, a center set up to provide education, job training and medical care for mixed race Korean children, called a press conference to protest conditions and to complain about the staff, whom they accused of theft and embezzlement. They accused Ted of stealing Christmas presents sent by the children’s sponsors and of spending funds on expensive suits. Pearl denied all of the claims, insisting that “the Center was a… success” and crediting” Ted’s brilliant executive talents” (365) .
? An article in the July 1969 Philadelphia Magazine, written by associate editor Greg Walter after months-long research and interviews, “dismantled Ted’s career and debunked the claims that Pearl had made on his behalf . In Walter’s account of her recent history, Pearl was rendered as the virtuous but gullible victim of an unprincipled conspiracy among Ted and his friends” (367-368).
? The article had “a devastating effect on Pearl and the foundation” (368). Ted resigned and fled to a house in Maryland that Pearl had recently purchased. Pearl rejected the article as so many lies and took over as the foundation’s chief executive. An investigation by the Pennsylvania state welfare department began and foundation business “came to a halt” (368). Sadly, the board of Welcome House chose to distance itself from Pearl and passed a resolution separating itself from PSBF. Pearl continued to defend Ted’s integrity and described herself in a radio interview as “a victim of an inexplicable conspiracy” (368).
? Despite all that had happened, Conn reports: “Pearl’s reputation survived more or less intact” (369). In fact, she was eighth on the 1969 Gallup poll of most admired women.
? By 1969, she was spending most of her time at her home in Danby, Vermont, which she and Richard Walsh had purchased in 1949. Here she and Ted, with her again, began a new project, trying to convert the old New England town into an art and antiques center. The project was not very successful, but Pearl remained in demand for speaking engagements and continued to write and publish with Ted as her constant companion.
? She returned to Green Hills Farm in June1972 to celebrate her 80th birthday. Back in Vermont a week later, she was hospitalized for treatment of cancer and pleurisy. Over the next ten months, she suffered unrelieved illnesses. By September 1972, she was back in the hospital for gall bladder surgery. Complications kept her there for the next three months. She worked the whole time in a second room supplied by the hospital as her office, aided by Ted, who handled her finances, and secretary Beverly Drake, who typed her manuscripts.
? Pearl died on March 6, 1973. Ted did not attend her funeral.
? Pearl’s family contested her 1971 will that had directed the major share of her assets and property and most of the royalties from her books to Creativity, Inc. and to the Pearl S. Buck Trust, both of which were controlled by Ted, alleging “undue influence to enrich himself at their expense….After deliberating for just over an hour, the jury found in favor of the family” (376).
To
Mrs. Stoner and the Sea and Other Works
?How long has it been now since we put these stories together to form yet another collection of fragments of life and feeling, giving yet another glimpse of the many human facets of Pearl Buck? Years? It has been years, yes—in time—but for me, in my own life, it has been an eternity of inner loneliness, for I have missed her, as I do miss her, as do many I know who have followed her life and her career with avid interest.
?As her biographer it was my joy to be her constant companion for the last ten years of her life and one of my self-assigned duties was to keep track of all of the essays and short stories she wrote and to see that they were put into some put into some publishable form in order that they could go to her readers as a permanent part of the body of her work. This collection was in process at the time of her death after which I was unable, until now, to take it out and reread its contents. It is too personal to me for it has been written out of her life during the years we spent together, and it is impossible for me, therefore, not to remember the actual incidents out of which each bit grew, for we both lived so close to them.
?Herein, for example, is the last story she wrote: “The Miracle Child,” written in January of 1973 before her death on March 6 of that same year. As I read this story I remember the doctor in the Vermont Medical Center in Burlington who told us the story while she was in that institution suffering from what proved to be her own terminal illness. Yes—since her death the time has passed with great sorrow for us all, but life must be lived, one’s work must go on. This collection is now finished. Complete or not—it is finished and is thus presented as a final chapter in the moving life and living work of Pearl S. Buck.
Theodore F. Harris
Biographer