Summary Of The Red Earth

The Red Earth: An Analysis of Colonial France
Colonial France in the early 20th century was a mass of contradictions. It was a republic dedicated to the rights of man; freedom, self-determination, and equal rights. However, it had a sprawling colonial empire stretching from Algeria in the northwest of Africa to the steamy jungles of Madagascar and Vietnam. The latter of which first experienced French colonization in the late 1850s (Herzog 9.3). Beginning after the 1858 war that saw the capture of Saigon, the French over the decades would gradually, over the decades, expand their influence over all of Vietnam Laos, and Cambodia. The consequents of this colony building that France, along with the cruel way they went about it, would sow the seeds
An admittedly propagandizing communist piece of literature that shows these consequents is the, The Red Earth by Tran Tu Binh a memoir of life on a colonial rubber plantation.
The Red Earth was made in 1964 as way for its author Binh to explain both what life was like for plantation workers in the 1920s, and 30s, and autobiography for why he joined the communist party and the subsequent uprising that took place at Phu Rieng plantation. As a high ranking member of the communist party and ambassador to the people’s republic of china, it’s a somewhat propagandistic tale, for example he uses a saying of ho chi min’s “the more people suffer the more they struggle” (red earth page number from book needed), but still valuable as a source for that time period. Binh’s story starts in 1926 in seminary school to become a priest. His parents dreams for him to become a
However its success was never as thoroughly accomplished as dividing by region. In the later part of the book the Michelin Company that was in charge of phu rieng in order to improve its appearance to the colonial government, and the workers who were suffering under horrible conditions, replaced the manager of the plantation with a man named Soumagnac. Soumangnac had a far more liberal ideal of sexuality that would have been clear violation of religious stricture. “Soumagnac selected each person with great care…Any man who went to work in soumagnac’s bungalow had to spread his buttocks to satisfy the manager’s carnal passions.” (red earth pg. 80) Needless to say women fared no better often taken advantage of for rape. Naturally this helped create the seeds of their own downfall, such clear hypocrisy would make for an obvious target for anyone to want to overthrow the colonial