Pearls of perspective Growing up in China, award-winning novelist worked throughout her life to strengthen cross-cultural understanding, Yang Yang reports. By Yang Yang | China Daily Global | Updated: 2026-05-14 07:47

https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202605/14/WS6a050daea310d6866eb48789.html In the history of Sino-US exchanges, Nobel Prize-winner Pearl S Buck, a writer from the United States also known as Sai Zhenzhu, stands prominently as "the most influential Westerner to write about China since the 13th century's Marco Polo", as described by late US historian James C Thomson Jr. Buck's true significance lies in her approach to cross-cultural understanding, says Guo Yingjian, a specially appointed professor at Renmin University of China, one of the earliest Chinese scholars to research Buck.