T H E P H O N G
A BRIEF GLIMPSE
AT THE VIETNAMESE LITERARY SCENE
1900 - 1956
translated by ĐÀM XUÂN CẬN
DAI NAM VAN HIEN BOOKS
Saigon, South Vietnam 1970, 1974
THIS EDITION , Feb. 2012 - HCM City.
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IN the last three decades the flowering of letters was astonishing. Of distinguished Vietnamese writers and poets in this period we may mention Nhất Linh, Khái Hưng, Hoàng Đạo, Thạch Lam, Thế Lữ, Xuân Diệu, Huy Cận.... These Western educated authors succeeded in creating a new sort of literature very well received by the youths. Had people such as Tú Xương and Nguyễn Khuyến, typical victims of history and helpess beholders of infamy, been in lfe by 1930, these authors would have been derisively dubbed as traitors. In all our history the voice of protest is clear and loud. There is no slightest doubt of our built in hatred of the 'oppressors', even when the contrary evidence abounds. Both Tú Xương and Nguyễn Khuyến spoke out their frustrations and anger at the colonialists. Our greatest poet Nguyễn Du gave up hid high post in the court when he could witness but not act, register but not influence events any longer. This induced him to write the immortal poem story by Đoạn Trường Tân Thanh ( The New-Heart-Rending Cry) . It was much the same with Nguyễn Khuyến and Tú Xương. Tú Xương met with failure after failure in the royal examinations:
If tomorow my name is not on the list
Remember, it will be the day of my passing away
Tú Xương proved a better poet than Nguyễn Khuyến. Tú Xương's life was amny times more miserable than Nguyễn Khuyến's. He was not happy with the royal ezams, and his destitution was all the more desperate with the coming of the colonizers:
Goddam it ! Chinese characters are not good;
Doctors and bachelors can be done away with
O folks, if I work as a Governor's office clerk
I'll have milk in the morning, and champagne
in the evening...
He only said this as a joke ! He never considered cooperation with the enemy:
I throw the medallion to the river
And I swear never to give in
Thank you ! Thank you !
More recently, the poet Tản Đà expressly wishd to be a coal salesman whose mission is to sell laments:
Dear wife , let us have our freedom first
Without it, nothing ever has any significance
Sleep, it is already late in the night
Sleep well and we'll wake up in time to work
This wise salesman was surely happier than a quisling:
Listen , dear, these quislings
They are not as happy as you might think...
His eloquent poem is no less than a serve indictment of the local mandarins. Immortal works should be written with the very blood of the authors. Take this case of Khuất Nguyên and his long poem
' Ly Tao' , Seu Ma Ch'ien and' Historical Notes' , Cervantes and his ' Don Quichotte', and
Dostoyevsky with his' Notes from The House of the Dead' ( 1861) .
Dostoyevsky should be noted for his uncanny insight into human soul. Dostoyevsky's influence on the writers of today was immense, especially his books' Crime and Chatiment' ,' The Idiot' and ' The Brothers Karamazov'. The 400 pages study by André Gide helped establish Dostoyevsky as a
novelist of unique pschycological and moral insight. When the Soviets came to power, they summarily dissimed Dostoyevsky as a ' mouthpiece of reaction and obcurantisme' . But throughout the time he was banned, copies of Dostoyevsky's works were secretly circulated and enthusiastically discussed by clandestine groups. So, the regime found it hard not to rehabilitate him.
Such critic as Belinsky (1) , Saint Beuve, and such writers s Dostoyevsky, Lev Tolstoy, Jean Jacques Rousseau could move things. When Dostoyevsky and his wife Anna Grigorievna ( or Dostoievskaia) came to Rehovsoe-Rasoumskve to visit her younger brother, Ivan Grigorievitch, a student at Vonia, there was a great number of students coming to see the writer nad his wife. All wanted to have a look at him personally, including those who opposed him.
This is a case in point to prove the tremendous impact of ' good' literature.' Vietnamese revolutionaries in exile were informed of what happened in their country by simply reading the books'' 'Giông Tố' ( The Tempest), Số Đỏ ( Luck) by Vũ Trọng Phụng. This is imporatnt: in due time, these books would change society; hence the need of a clear-defined point of view on the part of the creative artists and writers.
The immortal pages of Vũ Trọng Phụng did not come from the void. Let us keep in mind that he died a man wanting a steak. When a clerk to Godard's Stores, he was fired because he wrote in working hours. At the time he wrote' The Clerk' to tell the story of the revolutionary Ký Con, of the Vietnamese Nationalist Party ( Việt Nam Quốc Dân Đảng ) . We are remind of Stendhal whorled the life of a tramp, and Dostoyevsky who resigned his Commission on the Army to devote himself to literature in 1844. He was condemned to death in 1849. Although comuuted by the Tsar, he was sent to a prison camp in Seberia. He afterward described his experiences in' Notes From the House of the Dead ' . In his most tormented moment, he said to his second wife Anna , " You'll have much money to spend. A hell lot of money. I tell you the truth. Believe me, dear! ". He was sure of his talent. Stendhal also said,
" Je serai compris vers 1900". Van Gogh , prior to his suicide, completed' Le Champ aux Blés' and drank 33 cups of coffee on credit. Nguyễn Du, seeing that his contemporaries Phan Lập Trai, Thập Thành Thi failed to recognize his genius, wrote, " And three hundred years later from now / Who will weep Nguyễn Du poet". Friedrich Nietzsche wrote' Ecco Homo' to glorify himself because others did not appreciate his writings. Even Sigmund Freud did not have a single visitor on his eighty birthday. But after his death, hundreds of clubs conducted studies on his life and work. Think of it ! The irony of it ! If my memory does fail me, Pierre Brodin asserted that before the Second World War, writers wrote under the influence of either Dostoyevsky or Sigmund Freud. Another critic mentioned the name of Friedrich Nietzsche.
Returning to the faith of Dostoyevsky, geniuses would be rescued from oblivion, after their death. Luckily for Dostoyevsky, he had a very generous friend, the poet Nekrassov ( 2) who published his works; Bielinsky who discovered his talent; and Count Vielegorsky who warmly received him at his residence. Dostoyevsky did not forget them; he expressed his gratitude to them in ' A Diary of a Writer' ! Apart from this , he had a good and loving wife Anna Grigoorievna, just as Karl Marx had Friedrich Engels and his wife Jenny Won Wesphalen. These good people had generosity without thinking of it. Marx's refusal to accept an official appointment stemmed from the same motive as that of Vũ Trọng Phụng's discontinuing his clerical career and Dostoyevsky's resigning his commission: they all wanted to embrace literature in view of enlightening others. In short, a writer should have faith in his own talent and endurance. To me, Vũ Trọng Phụng invites comparison to Dostoyevsky: although Dostoyevsky always remained responsive to human suffering, he was not convinced of the possibility of an ideal socail organisation and did not have an active part in the revolution. In any case, he sided with the oppressed and he expressed what could be termed as ' pensée réactionnaire épileptique ' . To be an independent writer requires as much sacrifice as to be an revolutionary.
Like a revolutionary, a writer must ask himself whether he gets the right motive. Why should he
' accepter son lot' ? Only by this soul-searching could be distinguish the means from the goal and therefore, never to compromise with his sense of mission. He would not expect material rewards, should he decide to devote himself to literature. He must concern himself with doing good and never to be less than righteous. In Roman history, General Scipion liberated his people from the domination of Hannibal; Yet the folks were not thankul for it, they rather scorned him. The poor general languished in exile and on his deathbed, he angrily swore, " Ingrate patrie, tu n'auras pas mes os" . It is my opinion both literature and revolution are among easiest professions. No formal training is required, and yet, the aspirants have to overcome themselves first.
Such people as Hoàng Cao Khải and his son Hoàng Trọng Phu are downright contemptible. A contemporary of Phan Bội Châu, Hoàng Cao Khải wrote some excellent drames. But this is by no means enough to offset the bad reputation be incurred by cooperating with the French colonialists. We also deeply regret the missus of Phạm Quỳnh's talents. A self-made man, he succeeded in gaining perfect ease with the French language and convinced many young intellectuals of the need for moderniastion with his pen. Alas, at a later stage, he sided with the French domination. He even used his literary talents towards . He failed to fellow in the footsteps of another scholar, Trương Vĩnh Ký who had no part in anything but educational and cultural fields. As a result, Phạm Quỳnh was shot dead by the order of communist poet Tố Hữu in 1945.
Nguyễn Văn Vĩnh was also a good writer in the period. He translated La Fontaine's fables and became the editor of ' Đông Dương Tạp Chí ' ( Indochine Review), as model to the magazines. And he died, prospecting for gold in remote Laos. He will remembered, but no one forget that he also extorted money from the Frenchmen by his fake opposition to send his son to France for study. Among the respectable writers in the formation period 1913- 1930 were Phan Khôi, Á- Nam- Trần-Tuấn- Khải , Hồ Biểu Chánh, Đào Duy Anh, Nguyễn Văn Tố, Hải Triều ( 3) ...
Phan Khôi, the innovator of poetry, spent many years in Côn Lôn Island ( 4). In 1956, despite his old age, he played a leading part in the revolt of Writers in North Vietnam. Respect should also be paid to Tạ ThuThâu, Trần Văn Thạch, Phan Văn Hùm and Hồ Hữu Tường.
I am sure may readers will find my discussion of the Vietnamese literary scene from 1900 to 1956 a bit cumbersome. Why did I not have a purely literary or philosophical point of view ? Why did I always refer to the social setting ? To me the interrelationship between the man and his work could not be denied. You know that Nguyễn Du visited all the ninety nine mountains of the Hồng Lĩnh Range because he could not bring himself to cooperate with the new master of the land, Emperor Quang Trung. To us, this Emperor is the greatest of our heroes. Yet we also have the deepest rspect for Nguyễn Du's firmness. Thanks to him, we have the immortal' Đoạn Trường Tân Thanh ' . Later on, we have Tú Xương who did not betray our old Confucian ideology. He was both moved by the demonic passion for a world to be lost, and the fury over the arrogance of the 'new' order. I did not try to present the material chronologiacally. Rather, I would like to have the freedom to group writers of the same vein...
Great writers are different from the lesser ones by their discerning use of material. According to Belinsky the factual knowledge of events constitutes only the starting point of a work of art. The ' use ' of this knowledge is another factor which is far more important. Of course, this is only the opinion of Belinsky. A great writer is all his own.
' Giông Tố '( The Tempest) drenched in buffoonery. The setting of this novel becomes emblematic of the smugness and ignorance, the moral coarseness of the middlemen-proprietors that characterize a colonial country. The society of' Giông Tố is going stale from lack of freedom, seedy from lack of cultivation. Vũ Trọng Phụng hammers at this theme throughout the book, scoffing at the Vietnamese
' middlemen' for having done nothing at all except exploiting their own fellow countrymen. Originally, Vũ Trọng Phụng belonged to the ' working' class - his father died early and his mother managed a small stall in the market. But, by virtue of his schooling and subsequent career he had plenty of contact with the urban population including small merchants, middle-men and the high society; Hence, his first-hand knowledge of the social background of his book.
Unl;ike Vũ Trọng Phụng, Khái Hưng, the most representative bourgeois writer, was the son of a mandarin. As such, he was only good at depicting the high society, evidenced by his novel
' Băn Khoăn' ( Embarrassment ). When Khái Hưng tried to show his sympathy to the poor and the underprivileged, he was lamentably unconvincing. Consider the character Vọi in' Trống Mái' ( The Couple ) . In' Trống Mái' , Hiền, a good ' education' has a party to introduce her lover, the fisherman Vọi just a funny looking chap. She hurts Vọi unwittingly but fatally all the same.
In' Hai Chị Em ' ( Two Sisters ) Nguyễn Thị Vinh epitomizes the love between Triển, a labourer and the daughter of his landlady. Although the girl is aware of this, she neither accepts nor refuses his love, just leaving him in the cold until the day she abruptly gets married to a chap of her class! Nguyễn Thị Vinh 's imitation of Khái Hưng was very awkward. Khái Hưng' s Hồn Bướm Mơ Tiên ( A Sweet Dream ) was quite a good psychological novel in its times, but its interest now is mainly historical. Therefore, a work of similar merit cannot command our attention now. Nguyễn Thị Vinh's talent is considerable, but her view of art should change. We do not condemn her of ' romantisme du voyou ' embraced by such mediocre writers as Bà Tùng Long and Dương Hà . Imitation in literature is always harmful. We concede that among the writers of Tự Lực văn đoàn tradition there are three notable authors: Nguyễn Thị Vinh, Linh Bảo and Tường Hùng. At her best, Nguyễn Thị Vinh stands comparism with Katherine Mansfield. Tường Hùng was the author of a very good novel entitled' Gió Mát' ( The Breeze ). The only flaw of this book is the author's reluctance to be specific as to the social setting. Anyway, we know from the second part of the novel that is was about a family at the beginning of the Resistance era. His predecessor and master Nhất Linh committed the same fault in his favorite book ' Bướm Trắng' ( The White Butterfly ) . Had Dostoyevsky lived he would have been taken as only a minor writer, in case he was the same as in 1864. Just compare ' Les Mocedades del Cid' of Guillen de Castro and' Le Cid' of Pierre Corneille. Dostoyevsky still enjoys a large readership, because his depiction of morbifity in' Crime and Punishment' was typical of Russian society at the time. Manwhile, Trương of' ' Bướm Trắng' was only a pale reflection of Raskolnikov, and his portrait was a bit ' out of time'.
To Bielinsky, Gogol was the the spiritual father of Russian youth. In 1842, he published ' The Dead Souls' , a bitter satire. When Gogol moved toward reaction in politics, his friend including Belinsky were shocked. He wrote, " I do not like all my published works. Only those approved of by the Tsar still command my love ". An author's firmness in essential. Once again I reaffirm my stand in this crucial problem. A writer should strive to keep up his unflagging seriousness.
Now let us focus our attention on the case of Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh of the Hàn Thuyên Group - the author of the trio :' Thằng Cu So','Thằng Phượng' and' Thằng Kình' ( The Little So, Little Phượng and Little Kình ). Now he wrote' ai có qua cầu ' ( Whoever crossed the Bridge ) ,' Nhân bản mới' ( The New Humanism) ,' Làm lại cuộc đời ' ( A New Life ) ... These political novels were good, but not wholly convincing, because Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh depended on a rather coarse brand of logic . After the war, Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh, wrote under such pen name as Hà Việt Phương, Minh Ái Thành, Hoài Đồng Vọng, Đặng Tâm Thành, Vương Thương Thương ... He wrote' Nhân bản mới' to glorify Josip Broz Tito and Titoism. In 1957 , he published ' ai có qua cầu ' wherein he violently dnounce marxism, capitalism, deudalism, and the new mandarins. The whole story centered on a discussion between ' the Long Silhouette ' and' the Short Silhouette' by the lamp post on the Khánh Hội Bridge. At the end of the book, his faith in life is identified with the sunrise. Many will oppose the blending of fiction and philosophy. I cannot agree. Of course, there are ' entertainment', but serious literature cannot count on these trivia works. There are two kinds of writers: On the one hand, there are depictors of life; On the other, there are those wanting to influence the course of events. In ' Sartre par lui même' ( Satre by himself) Francis Jeanson wrote of the case of a certain girl named Monique who lived under the spell of existentialism, out of fear of a sudden death. This lead us to realize the impact of 'ideolgical' literature. A prominent member of Hàn Thuyên Group, Trương Tửu-Nguyễn Bách Khoa comtempt for his father caused his complete indifference on hearing the latter's death.
The Dadaist Group with Louis Aragon, Paul Eluard, André Breton, Philippe Soupault, Denos, Vitrac, Picabia was another case in point. I do not respect their politics which shifted from anarhism to communism and vice versa, with their poems were good, because they wrote out of their real suffering:
Comme des souris muets parlant dans une gare
Leur language tragique au coeur noir du vacarme
Les amants séparés font des gestes hagards
Dans le silence blanc de l'hiver et des âmes.
( Lea amants séparés)
He wrote many good poems in ' Elsa's Triolet Eyes' ( 1942) dedicated to his wife Elsa Trilolet or
' En étrange pays dans son pays lui même ( Estranged In My Country) in 1942 to express the soul of an 'un émigre de l'intérieur'.
Many French critics condemned this image. I say this only to prove a simple point : these poets were so good and were yet condemned in their time. Of course, the chance of a group of Vietnamese poets who tried to write in their fashion are not very bright at all. Returning to the Dadaist Group, Francis Picabia was so angered by the condemnatuion he spoke out, " Vous ne comprenez pas, n'est ce pas , ce que nous faisons ? Et bien, chers amis, nous le comprenons moins encore " (5) in the common manifeste. The 'Xuân Thu Group' was less successful than their predecessors. I have theree things to say about them:
first, they lacked sincerity; second, they did not have a language of their own; third, they did not know the purpose of their works. May I quote here a poem by Nguyễn Xuân Sanh, indicative of their queer of composing:
Lên mùa xuân khách vút xe hương
Vai nghiêng suối lạnh trái hồn đường
Gieo trắng dặm thơm đời ngát nẻo
Bó mùa chân ướt ngấn hoa sương
Ngập ngừng hương ấm bình thanh xuân
Tay thơm dâng sóng đậm chiều gần
Hồn gặp men chiều siêu mái đượm
Sương người tươi trái duyên riêng thân
(..........................)
( Người xuân )
It seems to me they toosed the letters in the air, and whatever the grouping they call it poetry. It could well be a sophisticated pastime, but surely not serious literature.
The shifting politics of such people as Paul Élurad, Louis Aragon, Francis Picabia was to me sign of their weakness of mind. The members of Đoàn Phú Tứ, Nguyễn Xuân Sanh, Phạm Văn Hạnh ( later became Thê Húc ) , Tam Ích. The new group Chân Trời Mới ( New Horizon ) of Tam Ích , in South Vietnam, to us, simply, ' flairer l 'idéologie marxiste plus que l'orthodoxie marxiste '.
Twenty years after the emergence of the Xuân Thu Group, there were Nguyễn Quốc Trinh and Thanh Tâm Tuyền. Nguyễn Quốc Trinh wrote poetry in the fashion of Paul Éluard. He was quite a good poet in his own right..
As for Thanh Tâm Tuyền ; author of 'Tôi Không Còn Cô Độc ' ( I Am No Longer Alone ) he was a lesser poet. His poem' Nhịp Ba Tình Cờ' ( The Dance ) , was only a trivial exercise of the pen. His novelty was simply not' convincing' enough.
Now we come to the Tân Dân Group ( Renovation) of Vũ Đình Long. The number of the group's works published was considerable, but its real achievements were conspicuously negligible.
In the 1950- 1957 period, there were very significant groups. Of course, we can mention the Quan Điểm Group ( View Point ) of Nghiêm Xuân Hồng, Nhuệ Hồng, Vũ Khắc Khoan, Mặc Đỗ, Tạ Văn Nho, Vương Văn Quảng... and the' literary chief' , Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh , former leader of the Hàn Thuyên Group. The only writer of some stature from the Người Việt Group ( The Vietnamese) was Mai Thảo. We still look for the Pa Chin ( 6) and Lu Shin ( 7) in Vietnamese literature.
We still have not seen any Vietnamese of international fame. We have may writers of genuis, but they lack an attitude of force. Consider Stephan Zweig ( 8) , Constant Vigil Gheorghiu ( 9) , Romain Rolland ( 10), Maxim Gorky, Lev Tosltoy and André Malraux.
Literature transcends the present time while the impact of politics is at best temporary. We in Vietnam often understand politics as the government in power, that is the present regime. And it has been established beyond any reasonable doubt that seldom is a regime popular. We have to make clear that what we are mostly concerned with is political phisosophy. As far as the spreading of ideology is concerned, writers are much more efficient than the so-called propagandist.
World history has taught us a bitter lesson: as soon as a revolution is ' victorious', writers should strive not to be associated with the regime they have help so much to make, and start anew. By virtus of his writings, Voltaire became the chief figure of the Enlightenment and Europe's political and religious conscience. Maxim Gorky was prominent in Russia as champion of advanced causes and of oppressed peasants. The Revolution made him an active Communist. None the less, he spent eleven years ( 1921- 1932) in Italy for reasons of both health and, it is said, politics. So, we see that if a writer chooses to be a revolutionary, he must remain so to the bitter end.
Talking of Maxim Gorky we cannot forget his achievement as the founder of socialist realism. He was also a Christian. His novel' Mother' ( 1907) and autobiographical works like ' Reminiscences of My Youth' are of particular interest. Out of destitution, he must work in a shop. At night he steals some candies and reads books by the lighjt. Despite repeated punishments by the boss, Gorky never interruption his self education. Alexis Pechkov ( or Mazim Gorky himself) never loses his courage and the readers wholly symphathise with him.
Not only was Maxim Gorky honored by such towering works as ' Mother' , his autobiographical works were also immensely successful. As a matter of fact' Mother' was essential reading for newly converted party members. Maxim Gorky also write poetry and a myriad of swell short stories. His
" Story of an Autumn' tells of an episode of his desperately poor and adventerous youth. That night, he met an wandering woman forsaken by her drunken husband. Their brief encounter was the starting of a perfect communion : both are in a similar situation. They must brave the threshing rain to get hold of a loaf of bread under a heap of rubbish. After this ' feast' , they slept locked in each other in icy weather until the next dawn. Upon awakening, the author found the woman had dissapeared.
Frantically, he set out in search of her, but in vain. He would never see her again. There is no preaching involved, but the noble soul of the woman really uplifts us.
His sublime art sometimes fills us with wonder. In a word, Maxim Gorky was a magnicent author; He embraced alomst every form of the literary craft including poetry. He wrote under the influence of
Pushkin (11) nad the Russian version of Charles Dicken's David Copperfield .(12) Maxim Gorky only used his native language. Gorky's ' En gagnant mon pain' was reminiscent of Dickens;s book, in a heartening fashion.
In the preface for his autobiographical novel ' Confessions of a Child of the Century' ( 1836) Alfred de Musset ( 13) wrote that an intense life was the condition for the ensuing writing. But only an artist n create a work of art, not a craftsman. It us not right to say that a labourrer's history of himself is seldom readable ? Remember that the most obvious book should be something more than a mere record of events in the life of an active man.
Consider the case of J.J. Rousseau ( 14) and Ernest Renan ( 15) and we will see the problems of a writer are not simply those of a historian and the like.
Since the thirties, only a hadful of our writers tried their pens at autobioghraphical works, among them Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh, Nguyên Hồng, Thiết Can and Mạnh Phú Tư
Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh wrote the trio' Thằng Cu So',' Thằng Phượng' and' Thằng Kình' , a voluminous work of nearly 1000 pages. He has unquestionable talent - but sadly, his work does not attain the summit of art. Constant Virgil Gheorghiu's L'homme qui voyagea seul tells of his own story. But the difference is obvious. Born at Moldavie ( Rumania) , educated at the seminaries Heidegger and Bucarest, he was the son of the head of the School of Journalism who let him stay in a small room at the School, he became an apprentice journalist and poet. Not long after that, he was conscripted following the outbreak of the conflict between Rumany and Russia, he was made the Commissioner for Culture in the Rumanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs at Zabreg, tossed in jail, having the experiences with the Russinas, the germans and the Americans. Exiled in France, he devoted himself to writing. He won fame, but was spurned by his praise of Germany during the alliance of Germany and Rumania against Russia. This drove him to utter loneliness and he felt as if living in another planet. His story is simple, but his forceful expression of despair leaves no one different.
Returning to Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh, he did not master the craftmanship of autobiographical writing. An ' ordinary' writer cannot write works of philosophical value. There is no realtion between' sincerity' and value as art. Constant Virgil Gheorghiu reveals his past, his present and his future so clearly, and with art. But Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh does not. This simply means, in this particularly difficult type of writing, he is more a craftsman than an artist. Gheorghiu did not tell us of his love affairs in his book, and yet it is not
' dry'. As for Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh, his book reads as essays.
Nguyên Hồng was a realist autobiographical author of stature. His book' Những ngày thơ ấu' ( Days of Chilhood ) is a sincere account of his family which must suffer both poverty and the contempt of others. But at some points, he is still weary of straight talk. Fortunately he has gone a long way. Most remarkable among his collection of stories' Lò lửa' ( The Fireplace ) is ' Những ngày đông xám' ( Days of Gray Winter ), a gem of a story epitomizing the tangled situation of a man about to fall down to the gutter, yet quite of salvation. This book is full of noble, revoltutionary romanticism.
The autobiographical works of Mạnh Phú Tư are well written and readable. His major work
' Sống Nhờ' ( A Shifing Life ) abounds in moving pages, especially those on the relationship between the fatherless child and his remarried mother. In this respect, it is reminiscewnt of David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. But is not directed towards total meaning.
After the Indochina War ( 1945- 1954) very few writers tried their hands at autobiographical works. Recently we had Nguyễn Văn Xuân with the pen name Xu Văn Ân. He wrote very significant short stories published in ' Văn nghệ mới' around 1955. Yet his novel ' Bão Rừng' ( Tempest on the Forest ) falls short of it goal. He still subscribes to a sort of mystic thought, evidenced by his description of the coming of a elephant to the house of the plantation owner to cut short the string of events.
Now we come to a first lass writer, Phạm Thái ( Nguyễn Ngọc Tân ) with' Truyện năm người thanh niên ' ( The Sory of Five Young Men ) . In the weekly ' Đời Mới' ( New Life ) in 1953-1954, Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh and his friend Trần Văn Ân , Hồ Hán Sơn were against marxism by their political writings, in the weely ' Tự Quyết' ( Self Determination ) Phạm Thái -Nguyễn Ngọc Tân used his talents as a novelist to fight Marxism, providing insights on the problem of Resistance and the Communists.
Before setting out to analyse the above books, I would like to reconsider the value of literature in the Resistance. To do this, we must assess the view of both the Nationalists and the Communists sides. The nationalists claimed having sides with the French only to get rid of the Communists, while many genuine resistance fighters thought they had to fight the French first, nad then the Communists. This is not a trivial issue, but a problem of life and death, as the very fabric of Vietnamese modern history is based on it. Our thesis is a follows. In 1945, just before the war, a coalition had been formed, so it is pointless to assume the Resistance was Communists controlled. On 19 February 1946, Marshal Leclerc led his army to take Hải Phòng Ville. There was no reason at all to fight against those who set out to defend our land. From 1939 to 1945, the Alliance comprised America, Britain, France, China and Russia. They fought the Axis powers. Only after their victory over Germany, Italy and Japan ( 1945) the' Free World' nations turned to their old friend Russia, on account of the latter's oft-maligned ideology.
Phạm Thái -Nguyễn Ngọc Tân was one of the first to explore the strange amity of the Resistance and the Commnunists in this immortal novel. He gave us a complete picture of the times - the agony of those caught between the love for the country and the apparent betray of tradition, evidenced by their allaiance with Communists, who were Resistance fighters at the same time.
' Truyện Năm Người Thanh Niên ' reads as an absorbing essay on the revolution, and the five characters are thoroughly convincing. Phạm Thái- Nguyễn Ngọc Tân made us know what an artist, a reformer, and a revolutionary are like. A writer must have a message to the world.
Four years later, many writers claimed to write about the revolutionaries, but not with the quality of Phạm Thái- Nguyễn Ngọc Tân. Like Nguyễn Thị Vinh with' Hai Chị Em ' ,' Thương Yêu' ( Brotherly Love ), and ' Xóm Nghèo' ( The Poor Hamlet ). In his story ' Hai Chị Em' , she wrote of the struggle between the Nationalists and the Communists; we know from the onset of her professed sympathies, but in the story she could not get the message across. I wish she had strived to tell a story only. There may be a considerable difference between theory and pratice, between profession and faith and creative ability.
Recalling the writers who resisted Marxism in the fifties, we should pay spcial homage to Linh Bảo, author of ' Gió Bấc' ( Northerly ). Exiled for some fifteen years she created a novel of astonishing depth of feeling. Her social provenance shed some light on the book. The daughter of a mandarin, she thought a marriage was not her whole lot. She came to Hong Kong on her own. Life was hard but she managed to survive. Even her ashma could not force her to leave her university, and she witnessed the going of the nationalist Chinese and the tale over of the Communists. The story was so simple, but the magnitude of her talents made it a memorable achievement. Particularly striking in her rendering of the Vietnamese revolutionaries in exile in China - they are all héros fatigué like Nguyễn Hải Thần ; and of the decaying society around her.
Nguyễn Thị Vinh is an excellent short stories teller. Such ones as' Đồng năm xu' ( The Five Cent Coin ) is thoroughly satisfactory. The problem is whether she can overcome an obvious falling off as to her art. All the same, it is difficult not to believe that the future will see her, along with Linh Bảo, as two indubitable masters, one in the novel, and the other in the short stories.
Bà Tùng Long and Quỳnh Hương are very minor writers. There is in their works, a rendering, characterized by ' bassesse de sensualité' . Ours is not a country lacking good woman writers. In the prewar era we have prominent nobelist, Thụy An- Hoàng Dân, author of ' Một linh hồn' ( The Story of a Soul ). Judged as a technical feat alone it is dazzling. But dazzling as it is, the technique is a means to an end, the exposure of the characters in all the poignancy of their intolerable situation : the reformed prostitutes. We can even compare this book with significent novels of the West, by Dostoyevsky for example. But she has been content to work in a narrow range of subject and character.
On the other hand, Ngân Giang, author ' Tiếng vọng Sông Ngân' ( Voices from the River Ngân ) , remarkable poetess, was a contemporary of Thụy An- Hoàng Dân. her poem ' Xuân chiến địa' ( Spring on the Battlefield ) published in 'Tiền Phong Review '( North Vietnam ) is quintessentially Ngân Giang, and in a sense the whole of her is there:
Princess Ngọc Hân dreamt of Nguyễn Huệ ( Emperor)
Because of his heroic exploits;
I also dream the young of the land
Will become hereos like him.
Our connubial bliss means nothing! Each of us
Is boiling with wrath and the will to fight
I have this counsel to offer you;
Regain our independence
I already see our land bathing in the ennemy's blood
Tomorrow, or the day after, when victory is ours
You will ride back to our cottage
You will see myself at work, spinning the silk
My cheeks rosy, and my hair of a tender green
If you should die on the battlefield
admist torrents of glory fit for a warrior
In a world remote from me, be assured, my dear,
The ravages of time could not change our love further.
NGÂN GIANG.
Poets Thế Lữ, Huy Cận, Xuân Diệu, Vũ Hoàng Chương, Anh Thơ... are not good enough to stand comparison to foreign poets. The poem' Nhớ Rừng' ( Nostalgie of the Old Forest ) of Thế Lữ is inspired by ' Ou sont les neiges d'antan' , Xuân Diệu famous line ' Love means death in the soul ' is freely translatd from ' Aimer, c'est mourir uun peu ' . Huy Cận ' I , in one endless sigh / Swallow the shaken image of a dying world ' is a rendering of this line ' Et dans un baillement avalerait le monde ' from' Les Fleurs du Mal ' by Charles Baudelaire.
It was not so with Vũ Hoàng Chương. His despair ennbled his poetry and breathed humanity into what would have been old verse ":
O friends, we were born in a century not of our choice
And spurned by the land despised by our brothers
Lưu Trọng Lư was the least influenced by the West among our poets of the era:
The instant when the prime sun shone by the window
I heard the cock crow in the distance
My destined path moved upon the tides of dreams
In darkness and in solitude
We may also quote Chế Lan Viên :
And sprint came as the uninvited guest
My heart was shaken with anguished cries
To me, everything is a nullity, a void.
For all this Hàn Mặc Tử, Trần Huyền Trân, Nguyễn Nhược Pháp , Nguyễn Bính, Thâm Tâm, T.T.Kh., Trần Trung Phương, Huyền Kiêu, Đoàn Văn Cừ, Đinh Hùng, Lan Sơn, Huy Thông, Hồ Dzếnh have had only local fame. Vietnamese poetry has had very little to offer readers of other languages.
As a matter of fact localism is at the origin of all this failure. Novelty in arts and letters is sadly lacking. A Vietnamese poet tries to write some good poems, while only an imporatnt body of works could make him interesting internationally. I put this down as an advice to poets of tomorrow.
The Vietnamese literary scene in the period 1930 -1945 bears striking resemblance to that in Russia in the 19 th century. Well-to-do families sent their children to French schools and the youths prided themselves on their fluency in the French language. Only the prsence of such writers as Dostoyevsky and Lev Tolstoy saved their country from cultural stagnancy. In our country, our best writers and artists slavishly imitated foreign writers. We must sometimes use French words as no equivalents in Vietnamese were available. In the works of Dostoyevsky and Lev Tolstoy we also found many italicized French phrases, annoted as, ' In French in the original text '.
The relation between politics and literature is undeniable. The extend Voltaire, J.J. Rousseau or Maxim Gorky affected society surely warrants investigation, and so does the contribution of the letters in the 1945 Revolution in Vietnam. Our writers worked under the influence of authors such as Racine or Voltaire or Boileau. They subjected their minds to the correction of the society, dissatisfield with the opinions and deeds of many members of their society. The impact of J.J.. Rousseau and Chateaubriand ( 16) was considerable.
The later eighteenth century saw the rise of a Romantic Movement, and the nineteenth century was rightly called 'siècle romanesque '. We in Vietnam were most influenced by the French writers, undoubtedly because of our colonial past.
Let us focus our attention on Alexander Pushkin. Modern Russian literature stems from him bypersonal and directcontact, as in the cases of Gogol and Lermontov, or more indirectly, as with Dostoyvesky and Lev Tolstoy. He excelled in all the literary genres, and while both a classicist and a romantic, he cannot be contained by either of these categories.
To a lesser extentr Khái Hưng in Vietnam was successful, free from ' Plagiat de romantisme'. He
received excellent Western education, but his literary work also bears the umistakable mark of the Vietnamese nation. This could also be said of Nhất Linh.
Unfortunately, the poets of the Tự Lực Group produced only mediocre works. Read these lines by Xuân Diệu:
I go on, mingled with the crowd
And the strangers remain strangers
My heart is a secret no one know...
Only after the outbreak of the Resistance, Xuân Diệu could write relevant lines :
I return, I have heard the sounds of music
Filling the sky, inviting the clouds and the waters
To ride down, as my mind at this beloved land
All morning, the wooden shoes clatter on roads
At midday, the birds warble to Summer
We the labourers face toward full sun, like nephews of the sun
Wheels roll, and the spinning of silk never stops
And the signs of what come : the new houses
There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sails,
I return to the big gathering
It is not late to seek a better life
O my country, my ever-blooming flower.
A latter poet, Quách Thoại, wrote with the same nobleness of the soul. Read ' Cờ Dân Chủ ' ( The Banner of Democarcy ) ,' Như Băng Trường Tình '( The Elegy of Như Băng ) , ' Em bé mồ côi ' ( The Orphaned child ' , 'Tôi Phải Về ' ( We Must Return ). here is a key portion of this Elegy :
Như Băng ! Như Băng ! Why all these tears
I all alone weep over my outcast state
My soul lost in the immensity of space
Rived by a love I never revealed to you, even once !
My lonely heart sinks beyond consolation
In the ever deeping coldness over my life
At end of daylight the sullen earth is mist- filled
I sadly look at the desolate expanse
My eyes shed tears none ever bother to dry...
As I think on you, and then my state
I wish to sing hyms for the sake of the world
Như Băng! I know your eys already set on Paradise
And my life is not wholly spared of misfortune
The eternal murderer is still in his dark pursuit
Of your golden body...
Như Băng, do you understand what I just said,
What I pray every night, what I know
Of this monstrous and mad world we live in?
O Như Băng, I cannot repress my love.
my fear and my hope
Do you ever know, how could you, I often ask
Why all these tears, and this death in life...
QUÁCH THOẠI.
Another prominent of the period is Colonel Hồ Hán Sơn, known for both his military leadership and his remarkable gift ( 17) ,and his tragic death in the hands of his Caodaist comrades . Hồ Hán Sơn is vey good in such poems as ' Hẹn Hò ' ( Encounter ) , ' Nén Hương Tàn ' ( Incense Sticks ), Tình Nghèo ' ( Love in Poor Couple ) . Although he wrote only a few poems, he would be well remembered.
' Tình Nghèo ' is the lyric for a song by Phạm Duy. I quote this poem in full:
I remember, I remember
When I was hired labourer
And you were a buffalo keeper
Under the shade by the bridge
We met, and love saw its days.
Just some betel leaves and areca nuts
Made us husband and wife;
A small hut at the end of the village
Sheltered us;
That year, the rice crop was good
We also have plenty of yellow corn
Happy laughters could be heard untill late night...
But my dear
One day
We shook the wooden bells to sound alarm
The pirates came
To our fields
We were deeply sad
At the sight of rice and corn plants;
On the roads, wives saw their men off
To war...
I joined the ranks
I was fighting the enemy to get to my place
Remember my promise?
' I 'll be back when the enemy is gone
I '' be back to th fields where I belong '.
Come on day, I am sure
They'll die, either from languishing
in the deep forests
Or being thrown to the sea
Remember my words, o love,
Think of our paddyfields when the war ends
Who'll scorn the fighters?
Who'll look down on the disabled veterans ?
Surely it will not be you
Remember love
As long as our old place is there, our love will.
You'll rejoice
At our country's independence
On the roads eveywhere
Young man return to their villages
We'll have two crops of rice every year
And plenty of yellow corn...
HỒ HÁN SƠN.
In the Resistance era, Hồ Hán Sơn was a regiment commander in the Fourth War Zone as poet Quang Dũng. The latter is the most gifted poet of the small proprietor class in the Resistance forces. He graduated from a Military School in China. His poems were published on regional papers, along with those by Tất Vinh, Hồng Nguyên, Yên Thao, Hoàng Lộc, Chính Hữu, Trần Hữu Thung, Phúng Quán, Hoàng Cầm, Trần Dần..
Among his most memorable works are ' Đi ' ( Departure ) ,' Tây Tiến ' ( Westward , Ho ! ), ' Tiếng Chuông Ban Trưa ' ( The Bell of Midday ) ,' Lính Râu Ria ' ( Soldiers with Beards ), ' Đường Dài ' ( The Long Way ),' Buồn Êm Ấm' ( Sweet Sadness ),' Cô gái Sơn Tây' ( The Girl from Sơn Tây Province ) , ' Mẹ ' ( Mother ) ,' Đôi Bờ ' ( The Two River Bank ),... In his work we find the banana leaves rustling, poor thatch-covered roadhouses, smoking field crab soup, an army marching in misty Nothern region of North Vietnam.
Another good poet is teacher Hữu Loan . Let us read a few stanzasof a much-anthologized work of his' Mầu tím hoa sim ' ( The Violet Sim Flowers ) :
On the wedding day
She did not wear bridal dress
And I was in uniform
My boots heavy with mud from the long operations
She smiled, so cute,
Proud of having a husband like me
The wedding took place in a hurry
It ended, and I had to go...
From the remote war zone
Love- filled, yet my heart
Was bleeding
For the girl who got married on war time
Only rarely did the husband come back;
It would be all right for me
No matter what happened
Yet, it shoud be terrible for her
Left alone in the deserted country...
But I was still alive
When she got killed in the rear.
When I returned I did not meet her
My mother say by her tomb
In darkness;
The flower vase on the wedding day
Turned into an incense burner
Damp with the chill of the air...
HỮU LOAN.
This poem was condemed by the North Vietnam Association of Arts and Letters in Hanoi as lacking in fighting spirit. Yet, the best poems of the period, written by those originally belonging to the small proprietor class, are of the same mood.
' The Vilolet Sim Flowers ' did for Hữu Loan what ' Viếng bạn ' ( Visiting Friends ) did for Hoàng Lộc, and ' Nhà Tôi ' ( My Home ) for Yên Thao. It telles of a soldier on guard duty on one side of the river looking at his occupied village on the other side . Instinctively his thoughts turn to his young wife, his old mother, and his relatives and he looks forward to the liberation day :
O my comrade
The artillery man
Could you tell me if it is time yet?
I already hear our shells shattering the enemy camp
Be careful, my friend
Don't let the shelling hit my home
My home is at the end of Đoài Village
It has a flower plant I keep to my heart,
and those I love.
YÊN THAO.
I do not want to advance inflated claims for the novelists of the Resistance. Nevertheless the works by Nam Cao, Trần Đăng, Nguyễn Trinh Cơ, Đình Quang, Siêu Hải, Lưu Hương ... represent a collective achievement of real competence and value.
Nam Cao ( 1916- 1951 ) first wrote children'books for Cộng lực Publishing House. He was the author of ' Nửa đêm ' ( In the Middle of the Night ) , ' Đôi lứa xứng đôi' ( A Well Matched Couple )
' Bẩy bông lúa nếp ' ( Seven Ears of Glutinous Rice ) ,' Cười' ( Laughter ) and many short stories for the
' Tiểu Thuyết Thứ Bẩy ' ( Saturday Story Magazine ) including ' Một Đám Cưới ' ( Wedding ),
' Lang Rận' ( A Country Physycian )...
At the outbreak of the Revolution Nam Cao brought to his books a deep love of his country and an unremitting zeal for his carft. Particularly good are his stories' Chí Phèo ' ( A Good-Hearted Bloke ) ,
' Ở Rừng' ( In The Forest ) ,' Đôi mắt ' ( The Eyes ) ... There is no plot in the conventional sense, yet, those are good stories. He deserved his fame as a ' un bon conteur '.
' Ở Rừng ' , presents Miss Vẩu, a cadre of great zeal and dedication to the Resistance; a pianter, worthy representative of the artists in wartime; old lady Quán from Cao Bằng Province , a typical soldier's mother. It is adequate to the demands of a simple characterization and the flow of an unsophisticated plot. Moreover, when the author turns the attention of his characters to the natural beauty of the region that they love their language is charged with lyric emotion. In some paasages he is reminiscent of Lu Shin and
Pa Chin. Obviously, he was an ambiyious author; Unfortunately, hios career was cut short when he was barely thirty. He said, ' These nights I could only sleep fitfully because I thought too much of the big novel of my career. My life has been rather miserable. I had to devote much time to pot boilers. As long as our country is in chains, our language is despised and our writers ill treated...'
Trần Đăng, author of ' Trận Phố Ràng ' ( The Battle of Phố Ràng ) , was also killed at an early stage of a promising career.
Not only do we have professional writers, but also combattants fighting with their pens. In spite of a sometimes clumsy technique, they all sought to penetrate to an understanding of their subject dependent on something other than a mastery of physical detail. In short, they tried to be better than ' écrivain occasionnel ' ( to use the words of Emile Henriot ) and they often succeed. Nguyễn Đình Thi might well peaking for many others:
'.. The great artists of humanity not only gave us their philosophical thoughts, but also let us share their loves, hates, sorrows and even their dress, evidenced by their works. Without this basic education we might not be aware thet a ray of sunlight, a bird's warbling, a blade of grass, and the human faces around us could create in us vision. In other words these great men taught us how to look at things by ourselves, even how to live...'
Nguyễn Đình Thi is right. Art is experience first and then the way you look. What needs stressing is no substitute for the real experience is possible. Consider Tố Hữu. He is a very good poet, and his rendering of prison life is so authentic. We still read ' Lao Bảo ' ( The Prison of Lao Bảo ) , ' Trăn trối' ( Last Words) , ' Người về ' ( Dream of Recoming )...
After 1954, Tố Hữu was like Lissauer. A famous German poet before the first World War he brought himeslf to write the notorious piece ' Chant de la Haine à L' Angleterre ', later set to music and sung by 70 million of germans. After the defeat of Germany, none bothered to think of him as a poet as he wrote rubbish. Literature reveals, in its artful fashion, national themes and attitudes. As such, it is an integral part of History.
Nguyễn Trinh Cơ served in the combat medical corps. His story' Em Ngọc' ( Little Ngọc ) is very moving. Ngọc is a little messenger boy brought to the hospital. Puzzled, he aks the surgeon whether his hand will be amputated or not. The surgeon is so troubled he becomes evasive as to the real situation. Ngọc remains stoic, not forcing a blunt answer, not complaining of his wound or bothering the nurse. But in his mother's visit, he is a child again:
' A few days later, his mother came to visit him in the hospital. She stayed to do the nursing to him. Every time I came to inspect his condition, he tried to smile, looking nice and cool. But the nurses revealed to me that in the absence of others, he asked his mother to be helful all the time, pouring him water or making him cool; At mealtimes, she should put bits of food into his mouth herself ..'
After his recovery, he gives the author a lesson of astonishing depth:
' I came to see the disabled soldiers, my old patients. Upon my departure, I wanted to come to visit the Third Battalion. I loudly asked Ngọc the location of this unit. Ngọc rushed to my side ,holding my sleeve, rising to reach my ears, mumbling, ' The battalion is stationed in village H.S.' I help him tightly in my arms, grateful for the lesson he gave me. Obviously, he cared for the feelings of these hurt soldiers more than I did ..'
Đình Quang treated a similar subject in his story ,' Bàn tay ' ( The Hand ) . he records the feeling and thoughts of a soldier who has lost his hand. His earnest hope is revealed as follows :
'... Many mothers came to see me. yes, they brought me solace, but my relief only came if they could give me a hand. Only a hand... O God, they knew it, I am sure, but they never dared to talk of it, no matter how vaguely. I see my severed hand eveywhere, and at all times, he abruptly raised his hand up. He stopped speaking. After a while, he put his hand in the pocket. Only then did he realize the bitterness of his impossible situation ..'
Lưu Hương had a ' haleine magique ' in his rendering of the retreat form the French troops in Thủy Nguyên , Third War Zone. There are only three survivors from the engagement in the rugged mountain. They have to suffer terribly from both lack of food and the enemy's pursuit. An is capatured, while Trung and Phương escape. After they cross a river, they meet a soldier's mother.
The story is memorable because of the author's unflinching search for details:
' A cold wind rushed in the mountain cave. Strong enough to break a sharply a human body. As soon as we caught sight of the mountain top, we knew we had gone astray; Surely, we ere not heading South because the North wind was tearing at our faces. Without respite, it kept howling... And we were aware of the high altitude of the spot..'
Lưu Hương was accustomed to the shelling he got the feeling of numbness:
' ... This goddam battle has raged for one day and the one night. My body was sore from the repercussions of the shelling around. Now the sound of cannon is a familar as the nightly cries of my little brother at home. I am above being bothered by the goddam shelling. In the worst moments, I could be aroused from sleep for just a little while. We heard distincly the partisans calling, ' Give up amd you'll be taken care of. If you know French, you'll be serving in the ranks '.
As an started calling names the bastards responded by throwing a dtring of grenades. And then the old refrain, ' Gave up now, you fellows.. The good Frenchmen give their words not to hurt you. Come on. you basterds! Our patience is running out. You'll be all shot ! Yet, no soldier with some experience could possibly have any doubt on the treatment specially reserved for resistance fighters. Summary execution was the rule '. Not the exception .'
Siêu Hải wrote ' Voi đi ' ( The Moving of the Cannons ) . A unit was transporting the big guns. After long days, weariness took its toll against them. They thought of using a buffalo. Its owner was willing to give it them, because her buffalo was so wild. Yet, in their hands, the animal could be handled with remarkable ease. They took care of it with the utmost dedication. Their unflinching courage and sacrifice made everything possible. This story is vey good.
I could not dwell here any longer. Interested readers could find studies on the works of these important writers: Lý Văn Sâm, Vũ Anh Khanh, Bình Nguyên Lộc, Thẩm Thệ Hà, Bách Việt ( Mai Văn Bộ ) , Nguyễn Bảo Hóa, Việt Quang, Văn Nhân, Quốc Ấn, Hoàng Tố Nguyên, Sơn Khanh, Ái Lan, Trúc Khanh... in my book ' Writers of the South: 1945-1950'.
My book ' Writers in the Resistance Era : 1945- 1950' give exposes of the work of the poets Quang Dũng, Hoàng Cầm , Yên Thao, Tất Vinh, Hồng Nguyên, Minh Tiệp, Phùng, Hà Khang, Hoàng Trung Thông, Phạm Hổ, Trần Hữu Thung...; and the writers Nam Cao, Nguyễn Huy Tưởng, Nguyễn Đình Thi, Trần Dần, Đình Quang, Hà Minh Tuân, Vũ Tú Nam, Siêu Hải , Kim Lân and Trần Đăng.
All these poets and writers were concerned with the response of civilians to the war for independence and the dedication of those who had fought for our independence. Yet, when disillusion came, we had no significant treatment comparable to such a book ' La Révolution Trahie' by Leo Trotsky. This was predicatble enough , as by 1950 the Communists succeded in exterminating the Nationalists elements in their ranks. They were no longer needed and should be get rif of. Obviously, this is not the reason for neglecting the poets and writers in the Resistance Era.
On the writers of the South, Thẩm Thệ Hà is still active. With him, we also find Bình Nguyên Lộc, Nguyễn Bảo Hóa ( with the pen names Tô Nguyệt Đình and Tiêu Kim Thủy) ; Lý Văn Sâm was lost in Cà Mau; Dương Tử Giang was killed when trying to escape from prison in Biên Hòa; Hoàng Tố Nguyên, Vũ Anh Khanh chose to come North. after the partition of the country . ( July, 20, 1954 )
The recent novel ' Đời tươi thắm' ( A Good Life ) by Thầm Thệ Hà should be rated ad a real flop. He fails to examine his characters with any depth. Portions of it claim to be autobiographical, but the author is wary of the past as much as hia uncertain present .
This was folloved by ' Hoa trinh nữ ' , an attempt at a sort of ' sentimantal éducation ' for highschool students. He did not fare any better. So far, his most successful aristic achievement has been the novel
' Người yêu nước ' ( The Patriot) , published a long time ago.
Bình Nguyên Lộc' s artistic development has been nothing short of remarkable, from
' Lò chén chòm sao ' ( The Glass Factory ) in 1950 to' Đôi bạn mắc hoa vông ' ( Two Friends ) in 1959.
Nguyễn Bảo Hóa , the historian author of 'Nam Bộ chiến sử " ( History of the War in the South ) , started writing novels ' Mía sâu có đốt ' ,' Tàn phá Cổ Am '. He is not good novelist; but his historical studies are excellent.
Phạm Thái-Nguyễn Ngọc Tân, author of ' Truyện năm người thanh niên ' ( The Sory of Five Young Men ) remains the best writer in the South. We can justly say that Phạm Thái-Nguyễn Ngọc Tân raised the standard of Vietnamese fiction related to war and revolution to hitter to unattained heights.
Other writers like Phú Đức, Thanh Thủy, Bà Tùng Long. Dương Hả... had very little to offer. They wrote under the banner of ' romantisme du voyou ' . Of them, only Trọng Nguyên is worth our attention because of his reluctance to produce soap storis - hispot boilers- and his resolve to turn to serious literature. He has all our sympathy. Besides, Lê Vĩnh Hòa , the author of ' Chiếc áo thiên thanh ' ( Ths Sky Blue Coat ) , could go very far indeed.
In poetry, we have Kiên Giang- Hà Huy Hà, a poet of great promise. His works caused much enthusiasm. He wrote in the same vein as Nguyễn Bính poet, his predecessor. What have written of Nguyễn Thị Vinh is also true of Kiên Giang- Hà Huy Hà. No matter how great his efforts, he would only collect meagre results. Imitation seldom pays off, especially tn the domain of arts and letters.
As a matter of fact, we have may goods poets now. To mention only the most typical ones: Phan Lạc Tuyên, Nguyên Sa, Thanh Tâm Tuyền, Tô Thùy Yên, Thanh Thuyền, Hoài Minh, Huyền Chi, Bùi Khải Nguyên, Chế Vũ, Nguyễn Quốc Trinh, Hồ Hán Sơn, Quách Thoại... Although Tô Thùy Yên had written only a small numbers of poems , he should be taken as the foremost aspirations of this time with substance and expressed in the resolve to explore experience to its limits.
Trọng Lang ( TrầnTán Cửu ) is still active, butr the falling off of his art is obvious. The author of
' Làm dân ' ( The Suffering People ) should be remembered with his prewar works. This could also be said of Đỗ Đức Thu and Đỗ Tốn . When being asked to write the preface for a new edition of
' Đứa con' ( The Son ) in North Vietnam ( Hanoi ) in 1957, the poet Trần Dần angrily retorted that this was waste of time. Now is the time of a new breed of authors like Nguyễn Minh Lang, Hoàng Công Khanh, Sao Mai, Văn An ...
Hoàng Công Khanh' s immoratal work ' Trại Tân Bồi ' ( The New Farm Village On Alluvial Soil ) ( 19) is extremely rich in atmosphere,life and movement. It breathes the excitment of peasant life; it captures the newly built farm village in all its moods, and it plunges the reader in the heart of a productive community ruled by love and democracy. The author's enthusiasm for the stimulating life of the peasants lends vitality to the pages of the novel. We look forward to the day all farm villages in our country being moulded after this
In ' Nhìn Xuống' ( Looking Down ) , Sao Mai shows the extent of his interest in ' socialist ' realism. Patient accumulation of details lends hid characters the force of real life. Yet, the accuracy of
Sao Mai's descriptions of the background of somewhat lessened by his lack of the objectivity in his presentation with preaching. He was obssessed by these words, ' The people of small proprietor class are both leftist and rightist. They side with the proletarians in the latter's fight against the oppressors. When they cannot smoother up their frustrations with the proletarians, they are quick to become reactionaries of the worst kind ..' . A girl being raped by her uncle; Ngân's death by tuberculosis due to her brother Mạnh's refusal to act dirty for money; A partisan denouncing the evils of colonialsm; The sincere and warm love of a present woman for her husband; those are presented with considerable ardour.
The hero Mạnh, a writer, is a victim of the cruel society. He turns to Thùy for moral support. He takes her as seond wife despite the fact Bưởi, his first wife at Lương Xá, has a son. Mạnh and Thùy come to start a new life in the poor hamlet near Năng's place. Năng takes are of Bốp for Phú Uyên , a parvenu and old acquaintance of Mạnh's poverty. Năng proposes to ask Phú Uyên to find a job for Thùy.
At first , Mạnh is not interested, but finally, he gives in. He brings his family to Phú Uyên 's. The latter tried to seduce Thùy. His daughter is raped by Xâm, het uncle. She is married to a rich man for money. She kills herself, but without success. Phú Uyên is tossed in jail for bankcrupcy. Mạnh and Thùy return to the suburb. Năng is out of job, the first wife of Mạnh dies of jealousy. Mạnh decides to say goodbye to all this. ' Nhìn Xuống' is a sombre novel. The wretched life of the poor couple forms a vivid background for the depiction of the decaying society. Sao Mai, through the heart rending scenes of his novel, violently attacks colonialism, capitalism and feudalism. His stand is unmistakable that of the oppressed. His message is simple. We must justice at all prices.
Nguyễn Minh Lang's treatment is so different from that of Sao Mai. Before 1952, he wrote only pot boilers in the fashion of Lê Văn Trương. His notorious books did great harm to the minds of young men and girls.
He changed completely with the appearance of ' Cánh hoa trước gió ' ( The Flower in the Face of the Wind ) . We find no trace of his old brand of ' romantisme du voyou ' ; instead, we see him turning to
' romantisme révolutionnaire '. Pervading this work is a symphathy for the under-dog, but in reading Nguyễn Minh Lang one is never conscious of being unduly influenced. He comes very close to the vital understanding that each man also fights himself.
Văn An' s talents are well expressed in his collection of short stories ' Điệu đàn muôn thuở ' ( The Eternal Tune of Music ) , of which the best one is ' Bến cũ ' ( The Old Wharf ). In this Văn An tells the story of love between Minh and Thơm. One day, Minh holds the hands of Thơm, the girl of the wharf. They take shelter from the sudden rain in a hut, and make love. This leadsThơm the most beautiful girl in the village, to suicide. She gets married to one witch who saves her life. The old man beats her almost daily. Minh is only aware of her lamentable situation a few years later when he happens to come back to the wharf for the send time. By then, the girl has been mad, and the place is so desolate, so cheerless.
The atmosphere of this story is sustained until the very last word, making it a memorable achievement. This sad story is reminiscent of the pure love between the shepherd and the little fairy in ' La Petite Fée et le Jeune Pâtre' by Maxim Gorky. We regret the fact thet such irresponsible critics as Thy Thy Tống Ngọc and Thượng Sỹ failed to give due recognition to the talents of Văn An.
Thanh Hữu was a serious writer. In all his writing he seemed to need the support of facts, derived directly from his own experience. His romanticism is essentially based on realism; his central characters are romantic in conception, but they are placed in the actual setting. In ' Đợi anh về '' ' ( Wait for My Return ) , he tells the story of a man who comes to the occupied zone out of annoyance with the inhumanities of the Communists only to find himself estranged and terribly disappointed. His autobiographical novel ' Chồng tôi muốn sống ' ' ( My Husband Wants to Live ) tells of the wretched life of a writer serious in his purpose and tormented by cruel deprivations.
Triều Đẩu was particualarly known for his reportage-novel ' Trên vỉa hè Hà Nội ' ( On the Sidewalks of Hanoi ) pubished in 1952. His novel ' Tranh tối tranh sáng ' ( Between Darkness and Light ) is a flop. His critisism is not good enough - he only depended on fleeting impressions. We can say he practised what usually defined as ' critique spontanée ) . ' Trên vỉa hè Hà Nội ' appeared in turbulent times. It is full of vivid sketches. What we retain are, in a way - ' Miss Chính ' ( In the Wandering Girl ) being forced by her own brother into vagrarncy; Suzanne, the French-Vietnamese girl being tormented by her ignorance of her father's identity and tortured by the new husband of her mother; A writer being ill treated by the cruel society, its code of ethics crumbling to pieces-vignettes. Besides the portraiture of identifiable characters and places and the lively evocation of the atmosphere of the times, the book does establish a point of view on the early fifties ( 1950 - 1952 ) and this is important. We are reminded of Nam Cao' s words in ' Ở Rừng ' , ' As long as our country is in chains, our language is despised and our writers ill - treated ... ' . When reading ' Nhà tôi ' ( My Husband ) Người đi ( Departure )' Tết Hồi Cư ' ( Tết of the Refugees ) is an idictment of a rotten society.
In his autobiographical ' Ảnh & Hưởng ' ( Flux & Reflux ) , Triều Đẩu romanticizes his past. He succeeds in making his carefree life as an apprentice writer real enough.
Apart from the above books, Triều Đẩu could be dismissed as negligible on the strengh of his only novel ' Tranh tối tranh sáng '.
Chấn Phong was a member of the first ' Quan Điểm ' ( Point of View ) , with Mặc Đỗ (20). He wrote ' Rừng địa ngục ' ( The Forest of Hell ) todeal with the French atrocities to the workers of the rubber plantations. As this is a rather grim subject, many chapters turn the reader' s stomach. Yet, the concluding chapter tends to slight to a clear-cut point of view. To him, the tragic death of the main character is enough to win forgiveness for the culprit.
Vũ Khắc Khoan was a novelist nad playwright. He was the author of the plays ' Thằng Cuội' ( The Moon Boy ) and' Giao thừa ' ( Betwen the Old and the New Year ) . In short, he was a playwright in the making, not yet a great one. To me, many writers published work in dramatic form which was a product of the desire to make some significent contribution to the literature of man's quest for a ' meaningful' existence. Such plays were often fantsy was no exception. His ear for speech was not flawless, and his dialogue suddenly became stilled and bookish, as can playwrights who work without a theatre. Apart from this major weakness, one always feels that with favorable conditions he would be a considerable playwright.
' Tiếng trống Hà Hồi ' ( the Drums of Hà Hồi ) by Hoàng Như Mai has enjoyed continued succees since it was first staged in Hanoi. He calls up atmosphere easily, he has strong sense of the kind of situation that creates dramatic tension. This historical play which tells of the victorious coming of Nguyễn Huệ ' s occupied Thăng Long City ( now Hanoi ) is of special significance to those who have had bitter experience of foreign presence in our country.
Now we come to the newest batch of authors working in South Vietnam. Mặc Đỗ recently published
' Bốn mươi ' ( The Age of Forty ) . Before stting cut to analyse this novel, I would like to discuss the case of the' Quan Điểm Group'. The readers may refer to two important books ' Đi tìm một căn bản tư tưởng' ( On Seeking a New Basis for Though ) and ' Nhân sinh quan Tiểu tư sản trí thức ' ( Point of View on Life of Small Proprietors Class Intellectuals) of Nghiêm Xuân Hồng. These names indicate the author's preoccupation with claiming a crucial ' role ' for his class in influencing the course of history. The achievements of the Group could not be dismissed as negligible. Yet, in the domain of literature, the Group has not yet found apt expression. The novel by Mặc Đỗ is case in point. .
Mặc Đỗ wrote under the influence of the ' conscience de l' Absurde ' of Albert Camus.
I feel in making this brand of nihilism his torch Mặc Đỗ is co-operating with the forcwes of desintegration. Irony could hatdly go further. Albert Camus got his Nobel Prize in 1956 by his work
' L' Étranger ' ,' Le Malentendu', ' La Peste,' La Chute', L'Exil et le Royaume,'Le Mythe de Sisisphe' ... These books are undoubtedly masterpieces. But for a Vietnamese, to write à la Camus is plainly dull.
Whatever we could say about Albert Camus, we cannot get him wrong as to his professed sympathics for oppressed Algériens
Jean-Paul Sartre wrote ' La Nausée' as his testamnet to the world.
I would like Vietnamese to take this famous line of Kropotkin as their motto, ' My only heritage is myself '.
As a matter of fact this quotation from R. M. Albérès could shed much light on Albert Camus' Le Mythe de Sisisphe , ' Univers dans laquelle est place l'homme n'a pas dessus pour l'homme, ni l'action, ni la connaissance reflexive ne nous font touches au doight une seule certitude à partir de laquelle on puisse construire ..'
What I am against has always been imitation. Nihilism makes sense in Western social context, but, to us, it hardly does. We have had one thousand years of Chinese domination, and one hundred yeras of French colonialism. We could hardly afford to turn blind eyes to the real struggle we engaged in .
Thanh Tâm Tuyền grew to manhood in the occupied zone. He had no part in the Resistance. He has been caught in a dilemne. For some reason,, he dared not come over to the Resistance; At the same time he did not want to be labeled as pro-French. he turned to nihilism as the only exit. The effort proved too much for him, really. This is evidenced in his way of composing poetry. He first translated French author Paul Éluard, Louis Aragon, then tore the translations and sterted writing poetry of his own. Could such poems be branded surrealistic ? I doubt it. We simply cannot seperate his attitude to life from the shape of his poems. In sum, his writings are products of literary revolt, but they are lamentably unconvincing due to failure to grasp at ' life- stuff'.
Let me turn to Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh and Nhất Linh, two giants of the pre-war era who still claim leardership in the Vietnamese scene now. Both continue to influence the writing of young men. They are the two great presences who made possible both imitation and resistance..
By the way of conclusion
We were born in the thirties, the roaring years of the ' Tự Lực văn đoàn Group'. Our bringing was literally in this very climate. It could be that our fathers were stirred by the revolutionary writings of the
' Hàn Thuyên Group'. There is no doubt about our mothers seeing themselves as the characters in the romances of the Tự Lực writers. In turn, we grew up under this twin influence.
In the early forties, the Tự Lực Group cessed to operate with the former arrogance and effectiveness ; By 1946, the Hàn Thuyên Group fell apart. We were left in the dark all these long years.
We began Fighting the French by the side of the Communists. The spreading of this alien ideology with its enevitable consequences hastened the process of our maturity. We were helpless at the sight of our fathers and our brothers being ill treated simply because they belonged to the small proprietor class. Many of them died in remote reformatories. Some of us went on fighting, others returned to their old places, now occupied by the French. But many refused to cooperate with the enemy.
Our lives would have been hopeless, but for the unseasy rise of the Nationalists in the South. We turn to Nhất Linh and Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh for faith and advice, because of their high standing in our community. Unfortunately, may of us have serious doubt of their wisdom now.
Nhất Linh has had no real experience with the Communists, living in China since 1946. It seems Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh left the Communists out of personnal reasons. But their mere presence in our ranks is heartening.
We must confess they looked very much as odd old men. Nhất Linh acted as adviser to
PEN VIETNAM . And we all know what it was : a bunch of no-gooders and non-persons in the literary world. Yet, his presence has brought no change whatosever. Obviously, his sharpness of mind has fallen off.
Would it be ludicrous to remind Nhất Linh of the above facts ? Would hew never become our hero again ? Regretfully, so many turn to him for advice. To him, we are just unknown people. Yet, he has never reality been a stranger to us, until recently.
During his stay in Dalat, following his departure from Hanoi, he disclosed to the local press he was no longer interested in politics. We learned of this with mixed feelings. But we were sure of one thing ; he would never become a Phạm Quỳnh, the scholar who cooperated with the French.
In fact, to adopt a comprosing attitude to the enemy is sometimes tolerable. In World War II, France was spared total destruction and wholesale - but chering only because of Marechal Philippe Pétain . No matter how severely people judged his actions, he was responsible for saving France; of course, not in the fashion of General De Gaulle.
Look at Chia in the late forties. It was Chiang Kai Shek who helped Mao Tse Tung to come out victorious of the bloody mess, the war between the Nationalists and the Communists. Yes, he so effectively helped the latter by his corruption. See how the Communists advanced !
It is greatly comforting to learn that the Vietnamese Koumintang was not so rotten as the so-called Nationalists and that the Vietnamese Communists proved no match for the Chinese Communists in effectiveness !
This a very important fact of history. In the year of 1949 when Chiang Kai Shek and his men were driven out of the mainland, the Communists were still reluctant to call themselves anything but resistance fighters. Only in 1950 they proclaimed the Communists Regime. Of course, the Chinese people were appeased by this reasonable stand. It was not the same with the Vietnamese Commnunists. They took all the Nationalists as hirelings of the French. History has proved the Nationalists were not all bad.
We talk of this because Nhất Linh was also a political leader with his real name Nguyễn Tường Tam. His statement, ' Literature and politics have nothing to do with each other ' have sense in the context of our society now. Of course , he better had nothing to do with the present regime.
In a talk with the scholar Nguyễn Đăng Thục, I asked him, ' With due respect, Sir, would you clarify this point for me. What you really mean when you said that literature and politics were two different things, and yet we had to fight Communism ? '. I assume both Nguyễn Đăng Thục and Nhất Linh are of the same mind.
From all these insinuations, I gather that lack of sincerity is what we must expect from these
' respectful ' men.
Are you above our comprehension? Did our national poet Nguyễn Du not wrote,
' And three hundred years after die
Who' ll weep over Tố Như the poet ? '
He might be right.
He might not .
To be born a Vietnamese in this century is not a desirable thing. To be born a Vietnamese writer is many times more deplorable, consisdering what his lot could be. Oh yes, it would be much better to be a Negro porter in Casablanca or an exiled writer in Paris. I say this out of genuis concern for you as a man, and not as smear tactics. No matter what you think, I am not the only one to say harsh things.
Once again we want to reaffirm that we deserve better things from our intellectual leaders. To the retort that they ahve a right to privacy. I agree wholeheardly; At the same time, do you not think that in whatever they do, they should be cautious.
Khái Hưng has died in the hands of the Comunists and Hoàng Đạo in exile. This should provide a further reason for Nhất Linh's firmness of purpose.
Despite all his striving, I still cannot put as much faith in Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh as in Nhất Linh. Of course I am aware of his unflinching energy in his present activities as a journalist and a mentor to many of our promissing writers today.
We believe in our capacities, This means I believe in myself, in my fellow writers, in those of my generation. We have lived through French occupation, the Resistance Era and the early years of Independence. We are only men of letters who choose to float or sink with it. If we still turn to, you, prewar writers, it is simply because we also depend on your experience. But we are responsible for our own fate. Your age has come to and end.
To use the words of Vladimir Mayakovsky,' This age is ours ' !
[]
Bà Rịa - Saigon, March 1958.
THEPHONG.
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( 1 - Vissarion Belinsky , Russian critic ( 1811-1848). His judgments of his contemporaries have acquired a classical quality.
(2- Nicholas Nekrassov, Russian writer and poet ( 1821- 1978). Nekrassov' s fame owes more to his generous sentiments than to his literary skills.
(3- One of the earliest Marxist writers in Vietnam.
(4- Penitentiary Island.
(5- You don't understand what we are doing for you ? Well, dear friends, we don't know either.
(6- Pa Chin, b, 1905- , Chinese writer. Best known to Western readers by his short sory
' The Dog ' ( 1936) which looks at man from the dog's point of view and finds him wanting.
(7- Lu Hsin ( 1881-1936) Chinese writer. His main concern was the condition of China and his
' Story of Ah Q ' had remained a classic picture of Chinese weakness. The sad role played by
the Chinese intellectual drew his withering scorn.
(9- Constant Virgil Gheorghiu, b.. 1916 - ) Rumanian writer, now he is living in Paris. Best
known to readers by his novel ' The twenty fith hours', ' The Whip' ...
(10- Romain Rolland ( 1866- 1944 ) French writer. He took up a position' above the struggle '
in World War II.
(11- Alexander Pushkin: Russian writer and poet ( 1799- 1831) . With Pushkin, modern Russian literature starts.
(12- Charles Dickens : English novelist ( 1812- 1870) . His popularity was world-wide and has
remained so.
(13- Afred de Musset : French writer ( 1810- 1857) . One of the banner- bearers of French
romanticism. In 1833 started a passionate liaison with George Sand. In 1836 he wrote
' Confessions of A Child of the Century' .In 1883 started a passionate liaison with George Sand. In 1836 he wrote ' Confessions of a Child of the Century '.
(14- Jean Jacques Rousseau ( 1712- 1778) His last yeras were taken up with the writing of his autobiographical ' Confessions'.
(15- Ernest Renan : French writer ( 1823- 1892 ) . His nostalgic ' Recollection of My Youth'
( 1883) nad ' My Sister Henrietta ' were very popular with the public.
(16- René de Chateubriand : French writer ( 1768- 1848) . His writings inaugurated the
Romantic Movement in France.
(17- Author of ' Nghệ thuật Chỉ đạo Chiến tranh ' ( On Conducting War), ' Chiến tranh Thứ Ba
bùng nổ Việtnam đi về đâu ?' ( Vietnam, and the Possible Outbreak of the Third World War )
(18- In North Vietnam, the Red River delta covers barely 6000 square miles and has been
entirely built by the river itself. Even today, 105 million cubic yards of alluvial soil
are deposited there each year.
(19- Du Minh Hoàng : Chinese Communist theorist, author ' Nhân sinh quan mới'
( New Humanism ).
( Translator's notes ).
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