NGUYỄN THIÊN THỤ * NGUYỄN CHÍ THIỆN

NGUYỄN CH í THIỆN, AN IMORTAL PRISONER
AND A VICTORIOUS POET
by Nguyễn Thiên Thụ

Nguyễn Chí Thiện was born in Hanoi on February 27, 1939. His natal village is My-Tho in the district of Binh-Luc, Ha-Nam province. His father, Nguyen-Cong Phung, was a low-ranking official of the Hanoi Tribunal. From 1949 to 1956, he received education at Nguyen Hue, Minh-Tan, Van Lang, Albert Sarraut, and Khai-Thanh high schools. In 1954, his family decided to stay in Hanoi, but his brother, Nguyễn Công Giản, who had been mobilized in the National Army in 1954 was the only one who went to the South, by traveling with the Army. Later, he was a lieutenant-colonel. After the fall of Saigon, he was put in the prisons in North Vietnam for thirteen years.


From 1961 to 1991, Nguyễn Chí Thiện was imprisoned many times for 27 years in Lao Cai, Phu-Tho, Yen-Bai, Ninh Bình and Hanoi prisons. On July 16, 1979, Nguyễn Chi Thien dashed into the British Embassy in Ha Noi with his manuscript of four hundred poems. British diplomats welcomed him and promised to send his manuscript out of the country. When he got out of the Embassy, security agents waited for him at the gate. Dragged to Hoa Lo prison, the famous Ha Noi Hilton now empty of US flyers, he spent another twelve years prison camps. In 1980 poems from the first collection began to circulate among the Vietnamese in the U.S., France and other countries From 1988 to 1991, he was transferred to many prisons as B14, Z10, Ba Sao. By the intervene of the Parliament and the President of France, Jacques Chirac, and the USA‘s Humanitarian Program, especially efforts of a retired U.S. Air Force colonel Noboru Masuoka, on November 1, 1995, he came to USA and lived with his brother Nguyễn Công Giản’s family in Herndon, Virginia.


WORKS: Before 1979, he had about 400 poems. After 1995, in USA, he continued composing a lot of poems.
His collection of Poems entitled ‘’Hoa Địa Ngục’’ was translated into many languages and have many different names.
-Flowers of Hell (Poems)
-Hỏa Lò Prison ( short stories)

In 1984, Flowers From Hell, an English translation by Huynh Sanh Thong was published as the first volume in the Lac Viet Series by the Council on Southeast Asia Studies at Yale University.
In 1996, Nguyễn Ngọc Bich translated his collection into English, named ‘’Flowers of Hell’, consisted of 151 poems in Vietnamese and English, published by THXBMD (General Publishing House of the Eastern United States).



Nguyễn Chí Thiện was an immortal prisoner because he was still alive after 27 years living in the communist prisons. He was a brave prisoner, as he dashed into the British Embassy in Ha Noi with his manuscript. He was a brave poet because he won fear in his heart. He was also a victorious poet because his poems were sent out of country and in 1980, poems from the first collection began to circulate among the Vietnamese in the U.S., France and other countries. His poems were the weapon to fight his enemies. The publication of Flowers of Hell was his first victory:
Hoa Địa Ngục Tập hai mà xuất bản,
Trận thứ hai ta lại thắng quân thù. ( Những ghi chép ụn vặt, 212)

If “Flowers of Hell II” would come out
I will win the second war.

Due to his bravery, the Parliament and the President of France, Jacques Chirac, especially U.S. Air Force colonel Noboru Masuoka saved him. Consequently, on November 1, 1995, he came to USA. He was a victorious poet because his poetry has made a conquest of Vietnamese and people’s heart around the world.


Different from other poets, he followed realism. He proclaimed his school of art, the school of realism:
Thơ của tôi không có gì đẹp.
Như cướp vồ, kìm kẹp, máu ho lao.
Thơ của tôi không có gì cao,
Như chết chóc, mồ hôi, báng súng. . .
(Thơ của tôi)

Nothing is beautiful in my poetry,
It is like fetters, blood of tuberculosis, and robbery,
And it is not lofty
But like death, perspiration and butt end.
( My poetry)

In fact, his poetry had many themes: love, love of family, landscape scenes and poetic meditations, but the major theme was political protest. His poetry ‘’was the cruel realities of life of war and prison, the sound of sobbing of my oppressed and mercilessly tortured compatriots’’[1].
In labor camps in Phu-Tho province and Yen-Bai province, he created about 100 poems on the subjects of the prison scene and anticommunism.
Nguyễn Chí Thiện described a communist prison:

Chúng tôi sống giữa lòng thung lũng,
Bốn bên là rừng núi bọc vây quanh.
Ở rúc chui trong mấy dẫy nhà tranh,
Đầy rệp muỗi, đầy mồ hôi, bóng tối.
Bệnh tật cho nhau, đời ôi hết lối.
Tuyệt vọng ngấm dần, hồn xác tả tơi,
Bảo đây là kiếp sống của con người,
Của trâu chó? So làm sao khó quá.
Làm kiệt lực nếu không giây trói đó,
Ốm ngồi rên , báng súng thúc sau lưng.. .
( Chúng tôi sống)

We live in a valley
With the mountains surrounding,
In thatched cottages full of bug
and mosquitoes flying
And we live with sweat, disease and in dark
Despair is slowly developing
Our body and soul are broken.
Are we men or animals?
It is difficult to compare.
We have to work so hard due to the rope and chains.
If we moan and stop working,
They will dig butts end to our back.
( We live)
In 1988, in USA, he recounted life in a jail:

ỐM ĐAU
Ốm đau cùm kẹp,
Xác thân ọp ẹp,
Dạ dày lại lép
Mà như có phép,
Cứ sống vật vờ
Thần chết cũng sợ
Quân thù man rợ,
Cũng không thể ngờ
Ngỡ ta chết bẹp,
Ngờ đâu trên thép
Nở một vườn thơ.
SICKNESS
I am sick and shackled
My body is skinny,
With a stomach that is always empty
Maybe due to a miracle
I survive.
That scares the Death,
And my barbaric enemies.
Who think I would die
They cannot understand why
A garden of Poetry
Would blossom on steel.
He revealed the real face of Ho Chi Minh, a Satan’s face:
Hang Pác Bó hóa thành hang ác thú,
Bác Hồ già hóa dạng bác hồ ly.
( Hoa Địa Ngục- Đồng lầy)
Pac Bo cave is a cave of wild beast,
Uncle Hồ is Uncle Fox ![2]

He criticized Karl Marx and MaoTsé-tung.. Communism is a kind of imperialism or colonialism:
Độc lập là chuyện hảo,
Khi đứng gần bác Mao.
Tự do là tù lao,
Khi cúng thờ cụ Mác.
Hạnh phúc là khoác lác,
Khi gạo tem đói rạc.
( Độc lập)

If you stand well with MaoTse-tung,
Independence will be slavery.
If you worship Karl Marx
Freedom is prison.
When you are hungry
Happiness means misery ( Independence)
He described human lives under the inhuman regime.

ĐÂT NÀY
Đất này chẳng có niềm vui,
Ngày quệt mồ hôi
Đêm chùi lệ ướt
Trại tù, trại lính người đi không ngớt
Người về thưa thớt dăm ba.
Trẻ con đói xanh như tàu lá,
Cày bừa phụ nữ đảm đang.
Chốn hương thôn vắng bóng trai làng,
Giấy báo tử rơi đầy mái rạ
Buồn tất cả,
Chỉ cái loa là vui.

THIS LAND
On this land, people are living in misery,
By day they are sweating
And tears flow nightly.
They were continuously sent to prisons
Or forced to go to frontiers
by military mobilization
But few men come back.
Children are very hungry
Women have to plough on the rice fields.
No men in the country
The death letters come continually.
Everybody is sad
Only the loud speakers are happy.
His poems aimed to struggle for human rights and freedom in Vietnam. He dreamed of a beautiful day:
Sẽ có một ngày con người hôm nay,
Vất súng
Vất cùm,
Vất cờ
Vất đảng .
. . . . .
Đặt vòng hoa tái ngộ lên mộ cha ông,
Khai sang kỷ nguyên tả trắng thắng cờ hồng.
(Sẽ có một ngày)

One day
People today
will throw away
their gun
their fetters
their flag
And desert their party.
. . . . . . .
They will put the crows of flowers
on the graves of their fathers
A new century begins
The white diaper
triumphs over
the red flag. . . .
(One day)


Nguyễn Chí Thiện’s poetry was his dream, a dream to awake his compatriots and people around the world about the Communist catastrophe for mankind:
My dearest wish was, is, and will be to see everyone wake up to the fact that Communism is a great catastrophe of mankind, as people have awakened to the Nazi scourge.
( Nguyen Chi Thien. Autobiography of Nguyễn Chí Thiện)

Nguyễn Thiên Thụ


[1]. Nguyen Chi Thien. Autobiography of Nguyễn Chí Thiện.
Vietnamese Literature Project
[2] Ho: In Vietnamese language, Ho means fox, a wicked person or animal.
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