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Copyright © The Center for Asia & Diaspora, Konkuk University. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored, or transmitted in any form without the prior permission in writing from the copyright holder. Publication Date: January 31, 2017

ISSN 2005-3037 (Print)ISSN 2465-8804 (Online)

Volume 7 Number 1 January 2017

Diaspora &Cultural Criticism

International Journal of Volume 7 Number 1 January 2017

Diaspora &Cultural CriticismSPECIAL ISSUE

Philippine Diaspora

Introduction: Filipino, Filipinos, EverywhereMaria Luisa Torres Reyes

Re-encodation of GUMIL Hawaii Writers’ Association as a Diacritic Site for Ilocano Hawaiian Representation Maria Socorro Q. Perez

Writing a Personal Archipelago in Luis H. Francia’s The Eye of Fish Francis C. Sollano

The Author as Reader: Gina Apostol and the Third World Metropolitan IntellectualMaria Gabriela P. Martin

Yearning in Carlos Bulosan: Toward a Queer Working Class ConsciousnessJeffrey Arellano Cabusao

ARTICLE

Humanism in Ho Chi Minh’s Prison Diary in a Third-world ContextPham Tran Thuy Anh

ISSN 2005-3037 (Print) ISSN 2465-8804 (Online)

The Center for Asia & Diaspora

International Journal of

Intersections of Diasporic Asian-American Literatures: A Comparative study between Zamora Linmark’s and Lois-Ann Yamanka’s Novel John Paolo Sarce

Child of Two Nations: Indonesian Perspectives on the Case of Mary Jane VelosoRamon Guillermo

International Journal of Diaspora &

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riticism | Volum

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The Center for A

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This journal was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea Grant funded by the Korean Government (MOE)

EditorsInseop Shin (Konkuk University, Korea)Zhenzhao Nie (Central China Normal University, China)

Associate EditorsDonghyun Kim (Konkuk University, Korea)Seokmin Yoon (Konkuk University, Korea)

Editorial Board MembersEduardo Zachary Albrecht (Mercy College, U.S.A)Michael D. Barr (Flinders University, Australia)James Bilsland (Newcastle University, U.K.)Lung-Chen Chung (Tzu-Chi University, Taiwan)Paul Graham (The University of Buckingham, U.K.)Daniel Hammond (The University of Edinburgh, U.K.)Tze-Ki Hon (The State University of New York, U.S.A.)German Kim (al-Farabi Kazakh National University, Kazakhstan)Guofu Liu (Beijing Institute of Technology, China)Hitoshi Oshima (Fukuoka University, Japan)Hsiao-huei Pan (Fu Jen Catholic University, Taiwan)Maria Socorro Q. Perez (Ateneo de Manila University, Philippines)Maria Luisa Torres Reyes (Ateneo de Manila University, Philippines)Susanne Schech (Flinders University, Australia)María Jesús De Prada Vicente (Fukuoka University, Japan)Choon-Sung Yim (Mokpo National University, Korea)Sangin Yoon (Seoul National University, Korea)Huang Chieh Yu (Fu Jen Catholic University, Taiwan)Poppy S. Winanti (Universitas Gadjah Mada, Indonesia)Wojtek Wolfe (Rutgers University, U.S.A.)

Editorial Assistant Florence Kuek (University of Malaya, Malaysia)Hyunji Lee (Konkuk University, Korea)

Copyright © Center for Asia & Diaspora, Konkuk University. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored, or transmitted in any form without the prior permission in writing from the copyright holder. Special requests should be addressed to the following address.

The Center for Asia & Diaspora Konkuk University120 Neungdong-ro, Gwangjin-gu, Seoul, 143-701, South KoreaTel: +82-2-450-3806, Fax: +82-2-456-3807Webpage: http://diaspora.konkuk.ac.kr/Email: [email protected] 2005-3037 (Print)ISSN 2465-8804 (Online)

International Journal of Diaspora & Cultural Criticism

| EDITORIAL BOARD | Call for Papers


We are delighted to announce that International Journal of Diaspora

& Cultural Criticism, a peer-reviewed journal specializing in diaspora,

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culture, slated for publication in 2017 issue (Vol. 7, No. 2). The journal of

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http://diaspora.konkuk.ac.kr/

SPECIAL ISSUEPhilippine Diaspora

Introduction: Filipino, Filipinos, EverywhereMaria Luisa Torres Reyes

Re-encodation of GUMIL Hawaii Writers’ Association as a Diacritic Site for Ilocano Hawaiian RepresentationMaria Socorro Q. Perez

Writing a Personal Archipelago in Luis H. Francia’s The Eye of Fish Francis C. Sollano

The Author as Reader: Gina Apostol and the Third World Metropolitan IntellectualMaria Gabriela P. Martin

Yearning in Carlos Bulosan: Toward a Queer Working Class ConsciousnessJeffrey Arellano Cabusao

Intersections of Diasporic Asian-American Literatures: A Comparative study between Zamora Linmark’s and Lois-Ann Yamanka’s NovelJohn Paolo Sarce

Child of Two Nations: Indonesian Perspectives on the Case of Mary Jane VelosoRamon Guillermo

ARTICLE

Humanism in Ho Chi Minh’s Prison Diary in a Third-world ContextPham Tran Thuy Anh

CALL FOR PAPERS

CONTENTS

International Journal of Diaspora & Cultural Criticism Volume 7 Number 1 January 2017

1–10

11–46

47–87

88–117

118–151

152–180

181–206

207–232

206 International Journal of Diaspora & Cultural Criticism ┃Vol. 7 No.1 2017

Abstract: This paper explores the elements constituting humanism

in HCM’s PD as explained in two different sections which explore

how humanism is embodied in five selected poems of PD and how it

underpins the poems’ aesthetics. However, it must be noted that the

politics of his poems also significantly contribute to the “conditions

of possibility” of HCM’s poetics. Therefore, the second section

explores how the aesthetics of PD may be linked to its politics. And the

conclusion of the chapter discusses the factors constituting humanism in

HCM’s PD.

Key words: Aesthetics, Humanism, Postcolonialism, Nationalism, Tang

poetry

ARTICLE

Humanism in Ho Chi Minh’s Prison Diary in a Third-world Context

Pham Tran Thuy AnhHue University- College of Foreign Languages,Hue City, VietnamEmail: [email protected]

Figure 4: “Be Compassionate” (Berbesar Hatilah), Poster and Call to Action of Indonesian Migrant Organizations and NGOs on 27 Apr. 2015

Submitted: November 17, 2016

Reviewed: January 1, 2017

Accepted: January 21, 2017

Humanism in Ho Chi Minh’s Prison Diary in a Third-world Context┃Pham Tran Thuy Anh 209208 International Journal of Diaspora & Cultural Criticism ┃Vol. 7 No.1 2017http://dx.doi.org/10.15519/dcc.2017.01.7.1.207

1. Introduction

It is worth noting that Prison Diary (PD) is the last published Vietnamese

poetry collection of an individual author written in Chinese characters

in the literary history of Vietnam. Moreover, its poetics is different

from the traditional one (Trần 2013: 549) because unlike apolitical

traditional poetry, PD is inseparably linked to the vision of the struggle

for Vietnamese national liberation. It includes 114 poems out of which

dozens deal with nature. Besides, it consists of a variety of genres, styles,

topics, themes, emotional expressions and thoughts (Đặng 2013: 80-88).

It was written during the period from August 29, 1942 to September 10,

1943 when Ho Chi Minh (HCM) was arrested by the Chiang Kai-shek

government and transferred from jail to jail in Guangxi, China, through

the course of fourteen months.

In terms of content, on the one hand, this collection of prison poems

reflected the cruelty of the Chiang Kai-shek prison system and government.

They unreasonably put innocent people to jail like in the poem: “The Baby

in Tan Duong Jail” or “The Wife of a Conscript Deserter.” PD also showed

how injustice and inhumane the prison authorities were in the poems such

as “Gambling,” “No Smoking,” “Entrance Fee.” Moreover, the images of

prisoners who were made to experience unspeakable sufferings all the way

to their brutal death were captured in the poems like “Prison Meals,” “Four

Months Have Passed,” and “A Jailed Gambler Dies.”

On the other hand, it was shown that HCM ― the individual ― was

portrayed in PD as a great soul, a great mind and a great revolutionary.

Firstly, HCM as a great soul was revealed in PD through the depiction

of profound humanism for the lowest class whom HCM met in Chinese

prisons. Besides, the poems “Sleepless Night,” and “Serious Illness” talk

about HCM’s love for the Vietnamese people who were under the French

colonial rule. At the same time, his deep appreciation for nature enriches and

enlivens his poems like in “Moonlight,” “Evening Scenery,” “The Weather

is Clearing Up.” Above all, one of the most important values in PD is the

desire for freedom as in the poem “Restrictions.” Secondly, HCM as a great

mind shows in poems talking about positive life’s laws. Important lessons

are captured in such poems as “Prison Diary,” “Hard is the Road of Life,”

“Learning to Play Chess,” “Advice to Myself.”

In terms of aesthetics, PD shows the specific and unique poetic art

of HCM by innovating Tang poetry, and in the process, modernizing it.

The poems generally look simple in diction but are actually profound in

meaning, as may be gleaned from poems like “Listening to the Sound of

Rice-Pounding,” and “Guards Carry a Pig.” In terms of themes, PD deals

with both ancient and modern topics; the ancient themes are found in “On

the Road,” and “Moonlight,” while the modern themes are explored in

“Regret at Time Lost,” and “Commotion in Vietnam.” Moreover, by the

use of personification, HCM successfully captures his deep appreciation of

nature. It might be said that HCM’s speakers are in harmony with nature

and the universe like in the poems “The Weather is Clearing Up,” and

“Qingming.” And in PD, especially in poems about nature, the tone and

rhythm are beautifully lyrical.

Therefore, this paper focuses on the elements constituting humanism

in HCM’s PD as explained in two different sections which explore how

humanism is embodied in five selected poems of PD and how it underpins

the poems’ aesthetics. However, it must be noted that the politics of his

poems also significantly contribute to the “conditions of possibility” of

210 International Journal of Diaspora & Cultural Criticism ┃Vol. 7 No.1 2017 Humanism in Ho Chi Minh’s Prison Diary in a Third-world Context┃Pham Tran Thuy Anh 211

HCM’s poetics. Therefore, the second section explores how the aesthetics of

PD may be linked to its politics. And the conclusion of the chapter discusses

the factors constituting humanism in HCM’s PD.

2. How Aesthetics is revealed in PD

This section explores how the aesthetics of PD is linked to its politics.

Both Hoàng (2013: 170) and Trần (2013: 52) agree that when talking

about HCM’s poetry, it is important to look into its aesthetics. Notable

is the fact that his poetry might seem on the surface plain in expression

and almost too literal and without metaphorical meaning. But his poetry

which is often characterized by the use of simple description or narration

might seem plain only until the reader realizes that a literary meaning is

embedded in the lines, raising the reader’s interpretation from the literal

to the literary level by its use of poetic techniques like juxtaposition in

order to create irony.

For fourteen months, Ho ChiMinh was kept as a prisoner in China. How

he was being transferred from jail to jail among the 18 districts in Guangxi

province from August 29, 1942 to September 10, 1943 is clearly illustrated

in the poem “On the Road”:

TRÊN ĐƯỜNG ĐI

Mặc dù bị trói chân tay,

Chim ca rộn núi, hương bay ngát rừng;

Vui say, ai cấm ta dừng,

Đường xa, âu cũng bớt chừng quạnh hiu.

ON THE ROAD

Although they have tightly bound my arms and legs,

All over the mountain I hear the songs of birds,

And the forest is filled with the perfume of spring-flowers.

Who can prevent me from freely enjoying these.

Which take from the long journey a little of its loneliness?

Đặng (2013: 83) argues that nature for HCM is an expression of his

revolutionary optimism. It is nature that protects the speaker on the way

from jail to jail. And nature also serves as a poetic inspiration; during

arduous days, the poet feels revitalized by nature, “Although they have

tightly bound my arms and legs”

In terms of literary art, this four-line poem has a rather special structure

in comparison with the others in PD. The first line has six words while the

second one has eight words. This feature is repeated in the last two lines. The

stanza shows a scene in which a prisoner, whose arms and legs are bound,

is on the way to another jail. It can be seen that the speaker has to walk with

his two arms and legs bound; it is thus so painful and uncomfortable for

him. But rather than express extreme discomfort, he expresses joy about

his surroundings: “All over the mountain I hear the songs of birds,/ And the

forest is filled with the perfume of spring-flowers”

Although walking for miles with bound arms and legs in extremely

difficult conditions, his physical suffering is equaled by the great beauty of

nature around him (Hà 2013: 281). The last line reveals that the experience

of comfort is not a matter of physical condition but of a mental state. This

belief gives the speaker the power to survive the “long journey.” The triumph

of the mind over matter through sheer will is a humanistic value in PD.


In short, PD, in general, and the poem, “On the Road,” in particular,

concretely show the challenges in the liberation struggle like the difficulties

that the prisoner has to bear, but the appreciation of nature seems to be a

strategy for reinvigorating him in life, and in his fight for his country and his

people. In other words, Đặng (2013: 72) is quite right when he says that in

the midst of the prisoner’s sufferings, freedom is experienced in nature.

Furthermore, in terms of poetic art, the poem differs with the others

in its form because it follows another convention of the Tang poetry. The

repetition of the sound “ay” in the first and second verses and the sound

“ừng” between the third and the last is touching. In other words, although

the poem follows the traditional Chinese form, it still reflects modern

content. The simple vocabulary and popular theme make his poetry more

familiar to ordinary readers.

HCM is said to be an optimistic person. Although he suffered long in

jail – he is quoted to have said “one day in prison seems like a thousand

years outside” ― the speaker in “Moonlight” appreciates the natural beauty

around him:

NGẮM TRĂNG

Trong tù không rượu cũng không hoa,

Cảnh đẹp đêm nay, khó hững hờ;

Người ngắm trăng soi ngoài cửa sổ,

Trăng nhòm khe cửa ngắm nhà thơ.

MOONLIGHT

For prisoners, there is no alcohol nor flowers,

But the night is so lovely, how can we celebrate it?

I go to the air-hole and stare up at the moon,

And through the air-hole the moon smiles at the poet.

At the beginning, the poem shows a fact that every one obviously

knows: there is neither wine nor flower in jail. However, that does not

prevent the speaker from enjoying the “lovely night.” He tells himself

“khó hững hờ” which means that he cannot ignore a nice view like this

as he is moved by the moon shining that night. As the first two lines of

the poem say, “For prisoners, there is no alcohol nor flowers,/ But the

night is so lovely, how can we celebrate it?”

From the perspectives of Eastern aesthetics, it can be said that moon,

flowers and wine are images of comfort and luxury. For the imprisoned

speaker, there is none of those; yet, he is charmed. He feels the beauty of the

nature by the moon light. The enemy could lock his body but they could not

lock his spirit. His body is inside the jail but his soul is free. He, therefore,

can see the moon shining outside, as the poem narrates, “I go to the air-hole

and stare up at the moon,/ And through the air-hole the moon smiles at the

poet.”

In the Vietnamese version, the term “cửa sổ” is equipvelent to “window”

in the English language but it is not the actual window. In the translated

version, the idea is captured more correctly: “the air-hole” of the jail. “The

air-hole” suggests narrower or more cramped space than window. It also

suggests that the prisoner could be below the ground or at least on a low

level looking up. The speaker watches the moon through that hole and

the moon also “smiles” at him. The poem uses personification in order to

portray the two-way communication or the dynamic interaction between the

moon and the speaker. In Vietnamese culture, watching and observing the


moon is one of the romantic ways of exploring the beauty of nature.

Besides, Đặng (2013: 74) notes that the moon has a special position in

classical Chinese poetry and it still takes that seat in HCM’s prison poetry.

The moon symbolizes light, coolness, peace, dreams, faithfulness to one’s

promise. The moonlight is able to make the nature around the speaker

more romantic and the thought of the speaker more profound and serene.

Therefore, in the poem, watching the moon is an expression of the speaker’s

desire for freedom, human freedom.

Like the majority of the poems in the PD, “Moonlight,” which is also

a short stanza consisting of only four lines with seven words in each line,

follows the form of Chinese poetry. Đinh (2013: 582-584) observes that

when describing nature at night, HCM’s poetry tends to picture an image of

nature profoundly, pensively and vividly. It is notable that this description

expresses the speaker’s thought and emotion. The first two lines suggest

an opposition and tension but the last two lines suggest a kind of mutuality

and harmony as the moon returns the speaker’s gaze. Therefore, this poem

best illustrates the aesthetics of PD: It moves from objective description

to the subjective expression about the significance of a scene or situation

drawn from prison experience, and observation from nature. Following this

structure, the description of nature is either an “objective correlative” of the

speaker’s feelings or a figural expression of an idea2.

Although the speaker in his poetry suffers from physical pain, his

sympathy for his fellow prisoner illustrates one of the elements of humanism

in PD, which may be found in the following poem in particular:

NGƯỜI BẠN TÙ THỔI SÁO

Bỗng nghe trong ngục sáo vi vu,

Khúc nhạc tình quê chuyển điệu sầu;

Muôn dặm quan hà, khôn xiết nỗi,

Lên lầu ai đó ngóng trông nhau.

THE FLUTE OF THE FELLOW-PRISONER

Suddenly a flute sounds a nostalgic note,

Sadly the music rises, its tune is close to sobbing;

Over a thousand miles, across mountains and rivers, journey’s an aching grief,

We seem to see a woman climbing a far off tower to watch for someone’s

return.

It has been said that HCM devoted his life to the cause of the

Vietnamese revolution. Hoài (2013: 110) cites Mr. Phạm Văn Đồng in the

People newspaper issued on April 14, 1960 who states that “Humanism

as the love and sympathy for other people’s pain is the best and most

significant quality of HCM.” Using a sympathetic voice, the anguish of

an imprisoned fellow prisoner/husband who has been separated from

his wife is unmistakable in “The Flute of the Fellow-Prisoner.” When

this poem is read in Vietnamese language, it really sounds like a sad and

haunting song: “Suddenly a flute sounds a nostalgic note, / Sadly the

music rises, its tune is close to sobbing)

This poem does not begin with a crying sound as in the one entitled “The

Baby in Tan Duong Jail;” instead, it begins with the sound of flute playing a

“nostalgic” melody. The music evokes the sobbing of a husband in prison,

missing his wife, and worryng for her. Nothing is worse than a happy

married couple forced to stay far away from each other. The poem uses

the repetition of the sound “u” in “vi vu, khúc, sầu” in the first two verses


making the poem’s tone even sadder. This sadness reaches its pinnacle in the

third line: “Over a thousand miles, across mountains and rivers, journey’s an

aching grief.”

The “aching grief” is a powerful expression of the deep sadness brought

about by their separation. What makes them far from each other is not

only because of the geographical distance but also because of the reality

of imprisonment. They do not know when they can be together again.

Therefore: “We seem to see a woman climbing a far off tower to watch for

someone’s return.”

The use of pronoun “ai” (somebody) by the speaker in this verse is

interesting because the reference may be either a female or a male. The

object “nhau” means “each other.” It can be inferred from this context that

both the husband and wife are missing each other, and they are looking

forward to meeting each other again. In the English translation, however,

the translator seems to generally understand the context and situation of this

couple in the poem but it seems that the translation captures only the sense

of the wife waiting for her husband’s return: “We seem to see a woman,”

as the translation indicates, but not the two of them. In other words, the

English version is able to capture the surface meaning of the last line only

but it does not capture the complexity of the poem, owing to the specific

characteristics of the Vietnamese language. In short, the poem illustrates the

deep humanism of PD in its embodiment of the mutuality of love.

3. How Politics is revealed in PD

This section explores how humanism is inscribed in the selected poems

of PD which underpins the poem’s aesthetics, and how the politics of PD

lay down the necessary foundation or the “conditions of possibility” of

its poetics.

Phong (2013: 473) illustrates that the following poem with no title

printed at the back of PD may be considered the “motto” of HCM. It talks

about how to live a successful life in this four-line poem, as follows.

Thân thể ở trong lao,

Tinh thần ở ngoài lao;

Muốn nên sự nghiệp lớn,

Tinh thần càng phải cao.

Body is in prison,

The spirit is beyond ;

If I want to fulfill a big business,

My spirit has to be more stable.

The poem reveals the strong will of the speaker who is imprisoned

(in China). Although his body is in prison, his spirit is not. The poem is

successful in juxtaposing apparent opposites as in the pairs of “body” vs.

“spirit”, “in” (prison) vs. “beyond” (prison), as the poem says, “Body is

in prison, / The spirit is beyond;”

The poem draws an image of a prisoner whose body is kept in jail

but whose mind is travelling freely elsewhere far from that presumably

disgusting and oppressive prison house. The repetition of the sound “ao” in

the word “lao” between the first and the second line makes this short poem

more meaningful and emphatic in expressing the longing for freedom. It


may be inferred from the poem that the speaker’s mind and will are free from

any control or domination: the human body can be confined behind prison

walls, but his or her mind or heart cannot be contained. The contradiction

of the first and second lines seems to illustrate the poem’s humanism in

which imprisonment is not only a question of physical confinement but

also a matter of human determination to be free. Yet, another value may be

found in the last two lines: Overcoming obstacles in human action is about

transcending physical limitations into the realm of spiritual freedom, as

the poem says, “If I want to fulfill a big business, / My spirit has to be more

stable.”

Trần (2013: 52- 53) notes that HCM’s poetry tends to be simple in

terms of form, innocent in terms of voice and lyrical in terms of tone and

rhythm. By depicting a “body in prison” the poem underscores the value of

human freedom. It may be said that humanism in this poem implies having

the strong will (“more stable”) to struggle hard for the sake of freedom

from capitalist foreign domination (“big business”). Hoàng (2013: 166)

suggests that on one level, this short stanza is a mere depiction of prison life.

On another level, it is beyond mere depiction; it is a revolutionary “motto”

for overcoming the difficulties in the process of waging and winning the

Vietnamese revolution.

Thus, it can be said, following Tran, that the colonizer can only keep the

body of the revolutionary in jail but never the spirit and the will. In short,

humanity is something that cannot be imprisoned because the more hardship

a revolutionary suffers, the better he becomes stable in spirit. In this sense,

humanism is affirmed by the poem.

HCM’s humanism is also depicted by the love for innocent people

especially for the baby who has to suffer from prison because his or her

father does not join the army.

CHÁU BÉ TRONG NHÀ LAO TÂN DƯƠNG

Oa...! Oa...! Oa...!

Cha sợ sung quân cứu nước nhà;

Nên nỗi thân em vừa nửa tuổi,

Phải theo mẹ đến ở nhà pha.

THE BABY IN TAN DUONG JAIL

Oa ...! Oa ...! Oa ...!

Father did not join the army force;

His son was half-year old only,

He, thus has to stay in prison with mommy.

Tân Dương is one of the districts of Guangxi Province in China. It is

in the jail of this district that the poem speaks of the inhuman conditions

of the Chinese prison. The poem above uniquely begins not with words;

rather, it begins with a sound, “Oa...! Oa...! Oa...!” ― the crying sound of

an infant, “half-year old only,” who is also imprisoned, with the mother.

Hoài (111) surmises that the cry of the baby is a cry for humanity, a

critique of the Chiang Kai-shek government. In fact, both Trần (2013: 54)

and Hoài (2013: 111) denounce the cruelty of the Chinese government for

putting the mother with her baby in jail because her husband has escaped

from the army: “Father did not join the army force; / His son was just

half-year old only, He, thus has to stay in prison with mommy.”

In this poem, prison has become a place to keep sinners or prisonsers,

the young and the old alike as well as a baby who can not yet even eat, walk,


or defend himself. The baby’s crying underscores the ridiculousness of the

government. Due to the fact that the government cannot force the husband or

the father to join the army, his innocent wife and son are put in prison instead.

The speaker seems to pity the infant and his mother. The poet, however, can

not do anything to help them except to use his only weapon ― the pen ― to

describe the injustice and oppression by the government. In this regard, Hac

is right when he argues that HCM does feel anger for what the powerless

people have to suffer in prison. His analysis is that HCM’s humanism is

about the 1Yêu thương vô hạn con người, nhất là người bị áp bức, niiiii

infinite love for people who are especially oppressed, poor and powerless.

In addition, Hoài (2013: 111) states that PD may not have captured in

poetry the many situations in the Chinese prison at length and in depth,

but his criticism of its oppression is so clear. HCM in PD and in his other

writings used his pen as a powerful weapon in criticizing the government for

their hard-hearted, merciless, ridiculous and unreasonable policies.

In short, the poem which only has a four-line stanza with seven words

in each line captures an image of the inhumanity suffered by the infant.

Through poetic expression, the writer succeeds in using very simple

vocabulary to voice out the vehement cry of a baby. The satirical tone of the

poem is a powerful attack on the cruelty and inhumanity of the government.

Hoài (2013: 108) states that the Chiang Kai-shek government maltreated

HCM while in jail in China such as depriving him for months of basic

human necessities such as adequate food, regular baths and a clean change

of clothes, because of which his body was covered with scabies and skin

infection. Worse, during the day, the prison authorities forced him to walk

from jail to jail covering a distance of around 50km long. At night, he could

not sleep but could only sit on the water closet to wait for the next day and to

continue going on foot to another jail. Thus, the poem “Cold Night” speaks

of the speaker’s sufferings because of the harsh prison conditions. It is

shown that the speaker has no mattress and no blanket on a rather cold night,

so he cannot sleep.

ĐÊM LẠNH

Đêm thu không đệm cũng không chăn,

Gối quắp, lưng còng, ngủ chẳng an;

Khóm chuối trăng soi càng thấy lạnh,

Nhòm song, Bắc Đẩu đã nằm ngang

COLD NIGHT

Autumn night. No mattress. No covers.

No sleep. Body and legs huddle up and cramp.

The moon shines on the frost-covered banana leaves.

Beyond my bars the Great Bear swings on the Pole.

The poem uses two short lines with seven words in each line to

portray life inside the jail. Vietnamese expressions tend to “beat around

the bush” but the poem, in this case, is very precise, concrete and direct,

“no mattress, blanket.” It moves the readers to tears because, as Hoài

(2013: 108) asserts, the worst hardship which HCM had to suffer was

not even from the harsh physical conditions but for the time wasted

in prison. HCM had spent 30 years studying and working abroad. He

was determined to return to Vietnam to liberate his people from French

colonization. But while his country was in need of a leader, he could

not return to his country; instead, he was put in jail in China. This kind


of time wasted was not only the speaker’s personal predicament but a

serious political matter because it was costing not only the speaker’s

individual precious opportunity to win the freedom but also to fight for

national freedom.

In the poem, the cold in autumn makes him sleepless, and the moon

shining during that night makes him feel even colder, as the third line goes,

“the moon shining over the banana makes him feel colder.” Moreover,

“no mattress, blanket, autumn weather and moon” combine to render him

sleepless. On one level, the prison context seems to keep the speaker awake,

but on another level, he is not able to sleep because he has to think of his

mission, vision and strategy for the revolution of Vietnam.

In that condition, the moonlight makes the speaker realize that “Beyond

my bars the Great Bear swings on the Pole.” The last line refers to the way

that the Vietnamese farmers in the olden times would tell the time. Because

they did not have the watch or clock at that time, they looked up to the sky

to check out the positions of the stars in order to guess what time it was.

In this poem, the speaker does not have the watch but the reference to the

moonlight makes him realize that it is four o’clock in the morning; still, he

can not sleep (Xuân 2013: 145).

In short, in a stanza with four lines in which each consists of seven

words, the author depicts an image of a prisoner’s life. In possession not

even of the bare necessities of life, he does not give up, powerfully revealing

his humanism. It can be seen that the writer has a unique poetic art: by

describing an objective condition in prison on one level, he is also able to

speak of the crime of the Chinese government to a delegate of Vietnam like

him, on another level. On both the literal and figurative senses, the value of

revolutionary humanism is embodied in the two levels of the poem.

MỚI ĐẾN NHÀ LAO THIÊN BẢO

Năm mươi ba cây số mỗi ngày

Áo mũ dầm mưa rách hết giày

Lại khổ thâu đêm không chỗ ngũ

Ngồi trên hố xí đợi ngày mai

ARRIVAL AT TIANBAO JAIL

Today I have walked fifty-three kilometers

My hat and clothes are soaking through, my shoes in tatters.

Without a place to sleep, all through the night

I sit by the edge of the latrine, waiting for light

The harshness of the conditions in prison in its extreme manifestation

is described in the poem “Arrival at Tianbao Jail” in which the speaker

has to go on foot for a distance of exactly 53 kilometers in a day. This

may be something unbelievable for readers: It is a very long walk for

a normal person unless he is a marathon runner. The inhumanity of

this punishment is unspeakable, but in the context of the experience

of colonialism of the Vietnamese people, the “long walk” had been

forced upon them for almost a century (1858-1945) under the French

colonialism. Many generations of the Vietnamese people had suffered so

much for so long.

In the poem, the speaker has to walk for a distance of more than 50 km in

a day. At night, the situation becomes worse when he has nowhere to have

a nap and no way to rest except to “to sit by the edge of the latrine.” This

description implies that the cruelty of the prison experience is enough to

kill the prisoner even without a bullet; the inhumanity of the experience is


enough to kill a man.

In the Vietnamese translation of the poem, the speaker is sitting on the

latrine to wait for the next day, “tomorrow.” In the English version, the

poem says the speaker is waiting for the light. Either way, “tomorrow” or

“light” may or may not come. In the meantime, time is fore-grounded in this

poem. In PD, time spent in prison is wasted because time is precious only

when it is spent outside prison for the peoples’ national liberation struggle.

It means that the speaker has no future or he is wasting his life.

It has been said that HCM’s poetry often uses the narrative genre.

PD does not have a long poem with complicated vocabulary or difficult

theme to appreciate; instead, as often observed earlier, PD often has only

four lines with simple words. PD simply depicts the concrete situation of

imprisonment, yet the significance may go beyond what is depicted in the

literal content.

In this regard, the poem above, on the one hand, can be read as the

experience of an individual speaker with a revolutionary cause to wage. On

the other hand, following Jameson’s assertion about third-world literature,

“Arrival at Tianbao Jail” may be read as a “national allegory” of the

Vietnamese people on their way to freedom and independence. It is about

the inhumanity they suffered as well as about the revolution as the triumph

of humanity. This idea is embodied further in the next poem.

The speaker in “Restrictions” speaks of the inhuman challenges he has

to face and overcome in prison as he is deprived of freedom.

BỊ HẠN CHẾ

Đau khổ chi bằng mất tự do,

Đến buồn đi ỉa cũng không cho;

Cửa tù khi mở, không đau bụng,

Đau bụng thì không mở cửa tù.

RESTRICTIONS

To live without freedom is a truly wretched state.

Even the calls of nature are governed by restrictions!

When the door is opened, the belly is not ready to ease itself.

When the call of nature is pressing, the door remains shut.

Hoàng (2013: 156) also denounces the Chiang Kai-shek government

for its unreasonable prison polices. In prison, human beings are treated

in the most inhuman ways. It is why later in 1945 in the declaration of

Vietnamese independence, HCM says: “Freedom and Independence are

the most valuable things” (Hoàng 2013: 157). “Restrictions” underscores

the inhumanity of life without freedom and independence by showing

how life in prison deprives human beings of the most basic of needs

such as going to the toilet. The implied analogy to the experience

under French colonialism before the declaration of the Vietnamese

independence is notable.

The reader of this poem is made to imagine a moment in life in which

the “belly is ready to ease,” yet, the speaker is not allowed to go to the toilet.

If the first two lines are descriptive, the last two lines are contrastive. The

poem creates two opposite images by changing the positions of the two

phrases “Cửa tù” (the prison door) and “đau bụng” (the belly is ready to

ease itself). The contrasting images create a paradoxical situation for the

prisoner: when the door is open, he does not need to go to the toilet, but

when he needs to go there, the door is closed. When one reads the poem for


the first time, he or she might think it is just describing some inconvenience

in jail. But if the audience re-reads it for the second or the third time, he or

she will immediately recognize its implication if associated with the cause

of national freedom.

In terms of theme, PD is able to describe the inhumanity of prison life

and its implication upon the speaker and the national freedom. In terms of

form, it adapts the Tang Dynasty poetic convention for its aesthetic power

of simplicity, subtlety and clarity. In this form, PD is able to poetically

convey the cruelty and sufferings in prison to a wide range of readers. So in

prison, HCM was able to address his people through PD. Dehumanized by

imprisonment, he is able to assert his humanity by speaking about humanism

through poetry.

HCM’s imprisonment ended upon the visit of Mr. Hau who was the

chairman of the local government at that time. How the author felt when he

was released on September 10, 1943 is described in the last poem:

BÀI THƠ CUỐI CÙNG

Sáng suốt, nhờ ơn Hầu chủ nhiệm,

Tự do trở lại với mình rồi;

Ngục trung nhật ký từ đây dứt,

Tái tạo ơn sâu, cảm tạ người.

THE LAST POEM

Million thanks to Chairman Hau who is erspicacious,

For giving me back my freedom;

PD ends from now on,

The deep gratitude is never forgotten.

Thanks to the chaiman’s decision, the poet is given back his freedom,

which implies gratitude for individual freedom in view of the fight for

national freedom. With the speaker’s release, the anti-colonial struggle

now continues beyond prison with HCM.

The adjective “sâu” (deep) together with the verb “cảm tạ”(million

thanks) in the 4th line of the poem expresses his deep and sincere gratitude to

the chairman. Moreover, it is implied that the speaker’s gratitude is eternal.

This deep and sincere gratitude expressed in the poem implies another

humanist quality which is embodied in PD. In fact, HCM has been referred

to as a “revolutionary humanist,” a quality which the speaker in “The Last

Poem” captures. It is the happiest “moment” of PD, and it signals the end of

the collection, the literary embodiment of the speaker’s prison experience,

and the beginning or resumption of life beyond prison.

It can be seen that the humanism of PD is embodied in the spirit and will

of a revolutionary. In addition, it is also about the love for a fellow prisoner

who likewise has to suffer the cruelty of prison authorities. Humanism

is also about the productive use of time for the cause of human freedom

especially national freedom. It is about fulfilling human needs, not the cruel

deprivation of such. It is about gratitude. Therefore, the speaker’s experience

in prison under harsh conditions shows dehumanization and the struggle for

freedom and humanization. In other words, PD’s humanism may be called

“revolutionary humanism.”

In short, this paper is about the features constituting “humanism” in

HCM’s poetry. It can be said that on first reading, PD might seem to be

simply about a prisoner’s everyday life in jail. However, upon closer study,

the poems’ aesthetics may be appreciated more clearly: PD is exceptionally

compact because it does not consist of long lines, rather, it is mostly


composed only of a four-line stanza with seven words in each line between

six and eight words. Still, it succeeds in depicting its complex themes. The

apparent simplicity of its language and style has made PD so popular to

people in all classes in the society, especially among the oppressed and

the poor who had little education at that time. It is both the aesthetics and

politics of PD that have made it so appealing to its Vietnamese readers.

Moreover, according to Hoàng (2013: 156), the word “tự do” (freedom),

in the poem “Restrictions,” has been repeated thirteen times in the whole

poetry collection indicating that PD is indeed about the struggle for freedom

for his people and the nation. In other words it is as if PD is a declaration

of freedom by HCM in poetic form. It is the freedom for those who had

been imprisoned by the colonizer, freedom for the people who were being

oppressed by the imperialists, and freedom for the whole people who

accused the Chiang Kai-shek government of their cruel crime.

In other words, due to the experience of imprisonment, in PD, the

speaker confronts his own humanity (his being a human being) and his

relationship with other people (within the actual confines of prison walls

and, as imagined, beyond prison) highlights his sense of belonging to a

community like the nation, even in the speaker’s moments of isolation as

a prisoner. Humanism in PD, therefore, is not just about the individual but

about a national collective ― the Vietnamese people.

4. Conclusion

This study has explored features of humanism in HCM’s PD in the

context of third-world literature. On the one hand, this study has

explored how humanism is embodied in selected poems from PD which

underpins the poems’ aesthetics. On the other hand, it has also explored

how the aesthetics of PD is linked to its politics. Both the politics and the

aesthetics of PD lay down the “conditions of possibility” of the poems

as third-world literature, framing PD’s postcolonial aesthetics. Read

as third-world literature, PD embodies the “national allegory” of the

Vietnamese experience.

PD’s humanism is rooted in the speaker’s sympathy for the marginalized

people, especially those who are disempowered because of their class

or their political views. When this kind of sympathy is portrayed in PD,

it becomes a figure for revolutionary humanism that shares with the

marginalized class or sector, the hardship, misfortunes, oppression, and

unfairness experienced under the ruling class or sectors. PD’s humanism

is meant for the marginalized people to realize that class struggle must be

waged so that freedom and happiness might be achieved. PD gives the

oppressed people a voice and hopes, and leads them to liberation (Hà 2013:

284).

Humanism is expressed in the description and narration of the prisoner’s

daily life in jail. However, upon a closer scrutiny, the poems’ aesthetics may

be appreciated more clearly beyond the use of description and narration.

PD is exceptionally compact because it is composed of poems which,

as mentioned earlier, use only four lines with seven words in each line

or having six or eight words. Although brief, the poems often succeed in

depicting a range of diverse and complex themes. The apparent simplicity of

PD’s language and style makes it so popular to ordinary people especially

among the oppressed and the uneducated at that time. In combination, the

aesthetics and politics of PD have made it appealing to its Vietnamese


readers. As Hà (2013: 290) states, humanism in PD is so profound that it

is embedded in many situations that prisoners encounter in their prison as

depicted in the poems.

PD’s humanism differs from the Western humanism in the sense that it

is not just concerned about an individual’s being or in Western humanism’s

language, “self-development.” On the contrary, PD’s humanism is about

self-sacrifice for the sake of the development of the collectivity ― the

Vietnamese people.

HCM himself thought of the development of his whole country as

he once declared, “The fact that Vietnam is able to develop or not is

dependent on the young generation’s educational background.” Clearly,

his fight against the French colonization was not meant for an individual’s

“development” but to pave the way to not only to particular human beings’

freedom but for the freedom of all the oppressed people of the world.

The apparent simplicity of PD’s language and style has made it so

popular among ordinary people. In terms of aesthetics, PD works on both

literal meaning and literary meaning. In a way, in a number of poems, what

may seem narrative is really poetic. This poetic strategy is characteristic of

the poems in PD which makes them seem simple but profound.

In terms of aesthetics, as discussed earlier, the study has found that the

poems in PD are mostly short which may be easy to read quickly because of

their brevity. The use of the Tang poetry form makes the prison collection

of poems popular among the ordinary people because they are rooted in

poetic tradition. It has also been observed that the word choice or vocabulary

is simple, drawn from the everyday language of ordinary people; yet, the

poems are rich in figurative meaning. In the choice of poetic elements, it can

be said that on a literal level, PD’s poems use comprehensible and familiar

images and metaphors; on a literary level, these elements are connotative

and symbolic. Besides, the study shows that PD’s poems often employ the

use of juxtaposition, binary opposition, parallel structures, and comparison

and contrast. Lastly, the poems are compact and easy to read because they

use popular and familiar form, style and techniques. In other words, they

may be said to be simple in diction but they contain complex meanings.

In terms of political content, humanism is politicized with the use of

themes like nationalism and choice of techniques in the prison poems.

PD employs apparently familiar, apolitical and popular topics consistent

with the poetic conventions of the Tang poetry. However, these familiar,

seemingly apolitical and popular topics are de-familiarized as the poems

shift from the literal meaning to the literary or figurative meaning through

the poems’ aesthetic elements and formal features. Thus, what seems at

first reading to be an innocent poem about nature, for example, suddenly

becomes a powerful political commentary in poetry about the struggle for

Vietnamese independence.

It is hoped that this study will pave the way for many other critical

investigations that might help bring further scholarly efforts into the world of

prison literature, an exciting topic for discussions but an unevenly developed

field of research, in order to contribute something truly significant to human

knowledge in the context of third-world literature, from the perspective of

Postcolonialism.

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Submitted: September 16, 2016

Reviewed: December 12, 2016

Accepted: January 12, 2017

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