Kevin Bown

Introduction

" Man canot stand too much truth " the poet Goethe wrote . Now here is observation more cogent than in the case of war . Just ask any soldier who has survived
a battlefield , any civilian who's walked out rubble of city or the burning
remnants of a village . The full terrible truth of the trauma is overwhelming
and ,scientist tell us ,faced with it ,certain systems of body and mind shut down temporarily .If the survivor is fortunate memories of the trauma may only
piecemeal and over time , if less fortunate the entire truth may arrive at once and
prove permanently debilitating . How then do we as human beings face the harsh
truth of war ? How do we the true depth and nature of its traumas , and how do we face the truths of its causes their consequences? Psychologists, Neurologists ,
and Social Workers may help us in understanding brain chemistry, issues of social readjustment , pharmacological interventions , but what issues
of the spirit ? What of the issues of the true historical facts ?
These are the realms of the artists and historian. The are the issues and
realms Tran-Van-Thu explores in the dialogues and essays that follow .
The importance of these the dialogue cannot be overstated . They are the first
to build a bridge across a river of , what for lack of a better word , we might call a river of comprehensibility, a river across which voices call back and forth , only
to arrive at the other side battered, seemingly alien and incomprehensible .
These dialogues are a first attempt to find or restore a common language
again among the Vietnamese who survived that series of foreign -imposed
wars that divided their country into three and then two partitions for most
of the century and left its people caught in the tangle of truths and lies .

Those interviewed include the esteemed and profound of Vietnamese
thinkers and writers , a rich diversity of voice , Writers Nhat-Tien ,
Nguyen-Mong-Giac ,Truong-Vu,Nguyen-thi-Hoang-Bac and
Hoang-Khoi-Phong speak frankly and openly of the one taboo
subject of political in the Diaspora as well as Vietnam and its impact
on writing .Director Thuy, himself tells unforgettable stories his
chidhood ,of friends and those who taught him how to be genuine human
being , of the difficulties he encountered to make a film depicting the lives of prominent exiles in Western Europe . The Family story of Cao-Xuan-Huy -
the relationship between him , a former Marine Lieutenant fighting in
south and his father , an intellectural who remained in the north ,
whose incorrigible thoughtfulness marked him as " Problematical" -
has in its unparallet pathos captured the deep pains that war
caused , at same time emits that sparkling light a deeply
humannistic culture .These essays and dialogues are essential
for any one who would understand Vietnam or understand the toll
idologies have taken in last century . We one an immense debt
to those who have courageously stepped forward to participate
in the dialogues . Their example goes a long way to restoring a spirit
almost broken in the wars and the hard years that followed ;
their dialogues help shrink the span of the river which has come
to divide the Vietnamese people and make the truth , though no less
painfull , a bit more comprehensible from side to side .

Boston. November 21-2003

Kevin Bowen
Dierctor , William Joiner Center
for the Study of War and Social Consequences
Principal Investigator , Rockefeller Program
" In -Re- Constructing Identity and Place
in the Vietnamese Diaspora - 2000-2003