Vietnamese American Women as Literary Torchbearers
Nha Magazine, Commentary, Isabelle Thuy Pelaud, Ph.D, Posted: Jun 26, 2004
The experiences of Vietnamese American women are often subsumed under the larger Vietnamese American category. Yet they play a crucial role in the development of their communities. Vietnamese American women are, for instance, taking a lead role in the domain of literature.
The three major Vietnamese American literary texts published in 2003 were all written by women: Monique Truong with The Book of Salt, le thi diem thuy with The Gangster We Are All Looking For, and Dao Strom with Grass Roof Tin Roof. Their stories are weaved within the fabric of American society, contributing to the visibility of Vietnamese American voices at the national level. Marked by diversity of genre and content, they demonstrate a comprehensive mastery of language and of narrative.
Vietnamese American women have written long before this moment. There are, among others, Tran Thi Nga with Shallow Graves: Two Women in Vietnam (1986), Le Ly Hayslip with When Heaven and Earth Changed Places (1990) and Child of War, Woman of Peace (1993), Lan Cao with Monkey Bridge (1997), Duong Van Mai Elliott with The Sacred Willow (1999), poet Mong-Lan with Song of the Cicadas (2001), and poet and editor Barbara Tran with Watermark (1998).
Some of these stories speak of memories of Vietnam. Those written by the younger generation also often address the topic of Vietnam, but with questions and observations. Some rewrite history through the eyes of families, others describe life in the United States, and still others reflect and explore the past, perhaps to better move forward. Finally, some stories spring almost entirely from the imagination of their writers, inspired by subject such as alienation, but also by personal visions that transcend gender and ethnicity.
The motivations behind these stories differ. Some write to tell their own version of history while others have more activist goals in mind. Others write in order to make sense of their past. Finally, some were born writers and simply fulfill their destiny. Of course, those are not mutually exclusive.
Having met some of these women, I am struck by their drive and tenacity to write, especially in the younger generation. Writing is a difficult task, especially if one has to work and make a living. Many are pressured to be practical and “make it” in a “proper way” in this country. Life as writers, I presume, was not what most of their parents had in mind. In this context, writing takes sacrifice and courage.
Running the risk of generalization, I would say that many of these women have felt more pressure than their male counterparts. Some is reflected and fictionalized in the literature itself.
Andrew X. Pham’s parents in Catfish and Mandala did not approve of his decision to quit his job and travel to Mexico, Japan and Vietnam on a bicycle, but neither did they overtly opposed it. Mai’s mother in Monkey Bridge, however, expected her daughter to stay by her side and take care of her. When Mai decided to leave for college, her mother committed suicide. If those two cases are extreme and should not to be read as representative of Vietnamese American lives, the differences in scenarios evoke the difficulties Vietnamese American women have encountered and still face when “breaking away” from the norms.
Monique Truong, in interview, explained that before accepting herself as a writer, she became a lawyer to meet an ingrained need for financial stability. Most of these women acquired other skills before becoming writers.
Mai Elliot worked at a bank, Le Ly Hayslip ran a restaurant, Mong Lan worked as a teacher, Lan Cao as a lawyer, and le thi diem thuy as a performer. Although most writers have to face, in some degree, similar challenges, it seems that those are heightened for Vietnamese American women.
All Vietnamese American writers, women and men, work within a publishing industry that privileges personal stories commenting on the legacy of war. They may do so by necessity, and because it is what they know and have experienced; yet they can also be limited by such expectations.
Although they may benefit from, or even may desire, to write as ‘ethnic’ authors, they might also wish to be recognized simply as ‘writers’, and be appreciated for the quality of their writing. Furthermore, they may feel burdened by reviewer’s insistence in identifying them as refugee or daughters of refugees. The practice of associating the author’s autobiographies and identity to their work is not systematically done after all for authors perceived as non-ethnic.
Their stories are significant because they bring a perspective and version of history that are little known. In general, their representations of women differ from common stereotypes generated by the War.
They tend to stay away from images of the innocent, sweet, giving prostitute ready to sacrifice her life for the ones she loves, as the one immortalized by Broadway musical Miss Saigon. They also do not replicate or reinforce the stereotype of the “Dragon Lady” embodied by the infamous Madame Nhu who allegedly compared burning monks to BBQ meat. Instead, they articulate Vietnamese American identities that resist predetermined images and associations. These stories, produced by artists and intellectuals, push the imagination of their communities. Some are simply solid works of literature.
As Asian American women writers, stories written by Vietnamese American women can run the risk of being read solely as narratives of daughter-mother relationships in exotic cultures. Although most of these writers seem aware of this danger and are actively resisting it, they may still benefit from that demand. A text like Linh Dinh’s Fake House (2000) in which language overtly expresses violence and rage for instance, stands very little chance to be widely distributed.
In the Vietnamese American community, one often hears the following motto: “Vietnamese men do a lot of the talking. Vietnamese women do a lot of the work.” While I abhor generalities and do not necessarily agree with this one, I will still end the article on this note, with a smile. Empirically speaking, it is true that Vietnamese American women, at least for now, are doing a lot of the writing.
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