Đăng ngày: 17:26 01-10-2008
Ethnic minority literature
Most ethnic minority literature remains oral in nature, although a number of collections have been published over the years.
Perhaps best known are the Black Thái epics Xóng chụ xôn xao and Khun Lú Náng Ủa, part of a valuable Thái literary legacy which embraces everything from histories and legends to riddles and humorous tales. The Tày and Nùng communities of the Việt Bắc developed their own version of the chữ nôm script from an early date and the literary heritage of the Tày in particular is also noteworthy, comprising as it does a range of epic poems (Nam Kim-Thị Đan, Lương Quân Bioóc Rốm), histories (Nùng Trí Cao, Nùng Văn Vân) and ancestral myths (Pú Luông-Già Cải), some of which date back to the 16th century. Folk tales and legends from both the Mường and the Dao ethnic minorities have also been preserved and published.Six ethnic groups of Tây Nguyên (the central highlands) - the Malay-Polynesian Ê-đê, Ra-glai, Gia-rai and Ba-na and the Môn-Khmer Xơ-đăng and M'nông - preserve a rich corpus of oral literature. These include the epic poems of the Ê-đê (Đam San, Đăm Kteh Mlan, Sing Nhã, Đam Di, Khing Juh, Đăm Thih), the Ra-glai (Uya Yuhea) and the Xơ-đăng (Dăm Giông), but perhaps best known is the Ốt N'Rông, a 30,000-verse M'nông epic discovered in 1988 which surpasses the Ramayana, the Odyssey and even the Iliad in size. A 21 billion VNĐ (cUS$1.3 million) project launched in 2001 by the Việt Nam Academy of Social Sciences aims to survey, collect, document, translate, archive and publish the oral literature of the central highlands before it is lost.
In recent years the ethnic minority communities have produced numerous contemporary writers of note. Foremost amongst Việt Nam's ethnic minority poets are Lò Văn Mười (b 1913, Thái ethnic group), Bàn Tài Đoàn (b 1913, Dao ethnic group), Cầm Biêu (b 1920, Thái ethnic group), Nông Quốc Chấn (b 1923, Tày ethnic group), Hoàng Nó (b 1925, Thái ethnic group), Nông Viết Toại (b 1926, Tày ethnic group), Lương Quý Nhân (1926-1996, Thái ethnic group), Lò Văn Cậy (b 1928, Thái ethnic group), Y Điệng (b 1928, Ê-đê ethnic group), Hùng Đình Quý (b 1938, H'mông ethnic group), Vương Trung (b 1938, Thái ethnic group), Nay Nô (b 1942, Gia Rai ethnic group), Lò Ngân Sủn (b 1945, Giáy ethnic group), Pờ Sảo Mìn (b 1946, Pa Dí ethnic group), Y Phương (Hứa Vĩnh Sước, b 1948, Tày ethnic group) and Inrasara (Phú Trạm, b 1957, Chăm ethnic group). The ethnic minority communities have also produced a handful of important prose writers, including Nông Minh Châu (1924-1979, Tày ethnic group), Ma Trường Nguyên (b 1944, Tày ethnic group) and Linh Nga Niêk Đăm (b 1948, Ê-đê ethnic group).
Current issues
The exponential growth of publishing in the years since đổi mới has provided Việt Nam's flourishing literary community with many new avenues of opportunity, including increased space for literary polemics and greater access to foreign work in translation. Readership continues to develop steadily and, although it remains comparatively difficult for a writer to get his or her work published in Việt Nam or indeed to make a living solely from writing, many new Vietnamese writers do come to the fore every year.At the same time, new economic pressures have obliged all publishing houses to diversify their activities in order to remain in profit. As in so many other parts of the world, the inclusion in leading magazines of sensational stories and pictures, often culled from foreign publications, and the publication of cheap romances, thrillers, pop star biographies and other commercial merchandise by even the more reputable publishing houses has become an unavoidable fact of life.
However one of the biggest problems facing the Vietnamese literary scene is that of copyright. Authors' rights are still all too often inadequately defined in contractual arrangements with publishers, making it difficult for Vietnamese writers to know the extent to which their work is sold and to reap the benefits of these sales. Most significantly, works by both Vietnamese and overseas authors continue to be reproduced and sold in Việt Nam without the authors' permission. As Việt Nam prepares to participate in various international trade agreements (including in October 2004 becoming the 156th signatory to the Berne Convention), the thorny issue of intellectual property and copyright legislation has recently become an area of major concern. Basic legislation in this area under the Civil Code Part VI (Intellectual Property Rights and Technology Transfer) has already been enacted and a National Copyright Office set up within the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, but at the time of writing the ideas behind copyright law and the potential benefits for Vietnamese writers have yet to be understood fully by the literary community.In recent years the Việt Nam Writers’ Association has been working hard to educate its members about the concept of copyright, drafting model publishing contracts and setting up a fund to support writers who are seeking legal redress against copyright infringements. The expectation is that the effects of a number of cases brought to court and decided in favour of the authors will establish the necessary jurisprudence in the Vietnamese legal system and will also act as deterrent against future infringements.
