Montira Rato
Department of Eastern Languages, Faculty of Arts, Chulalongkorn University
Xuân Quỳnh (1942-1988) is regarded as the most prominent Vietnamese poet in the twentieth century. Having grown up and writing amid the deprivation of the Vietnam War, her poems reveal how humanity blossoms, hope can emerge from wartime hardship and childhood memories are cherished. Words used in her poetry are simple, but clearly come from her heart and can reflect a person’s ability to love, to appreciate life and reach a finer self. Not only are wartime scenes portrayed in her poems, human experiences, especially from a perspective of a woman, are also vividly depicted. Xuân Quỳnh focuses on love, motherhood and human interaction, while most male poets in her generation pay more attention to the conflicts and heroism of the war. Her poems stand the test of time as even today they are still read, loved and translated into several foreign languages. In 2016, she was posthumously awarded Vietnam’s State prize in Literature and Arts, including the Ho Chi Minh Prize in Literature and Arts, regarded as the highest-ranking award of its kind in the country.
(Presented in the international conference – Prominent Women in the ASEAN Community, 13 July 2018, Le Meridien Hotel, Bangkok, organized by Institute of Thai Studies and Faculty of Education, Chulalongkorn University)