I found Ha Jin’s An Entrepreneur’s Story to be an interesting way of showing where wealth and culture overlap. I especially found it interesting when considering the narrator and the way they see themselves as a sort of “victim” to everything. Even after he becomes wealthy and gets the girl he wants, he still seems to have a vindictive nature in seeking more to satisfy himself.
The beginning of the story has the narrator trying to make something of himself for a girl who he has been rejected by–for being poor or criminal or both. The theme of working towards a brighter future seems to carry throughout, but also seems to take a turn once he does finally have a successful business. Unsure what to do with his wealth, he looks for ways to keep it from the state. This is very similar to ways wealthy Americans deal with their assets.
As the narrator becomes wealthy, people around him treat him differently. Without realizing it, I think he starts to act differently. Where before he had been humbled by Manshan, she had left him and he started acting out when people doubted him the way her mother, Mrs. Pan, had. This gains him a reputation and respect as a wealthy and eligible bachelor. Now Mrs. Pan wants him to marry her daughter.
But now getting Manshan, he finds it too easy and comes to resent her happy youth and inability to become pregnant. His hatred for Mrs. Pan grows as well, and he hits her and considers using her as a way to have a child.
Overall, wealth seems to be a controlling factor for every aspect of life and social standing for the narrator and those around him. I think this is very similar to the way wealth changes people today, though I never considered the way people who’ve come into wealth may not realize how it changes their own personalities.