In addition, as a historical material, language plays a core role in literary and artistic creation. As the raw material, the first means of literature and art, language has helped artists reflect, express and explain life through the world of art in a rich and vivid way. As a tool of communication and thinking, language has shown its basic function in the development of human thought and spiritual culture. Because language is the most important communication tool, the direct reality of thought. " All cultural products, whether material or spiritual, originate from language " [26, p.30]. That shows that the change and development of language always go hand in hand with the change and development of culture. To study culture deeply, to examine the cultural meaning in the speech, communication habits and literature and art of a nation, one must go through language and of course, to go deep into language, one must pay attention to cultural content. Therefore, language not only plays the role of a direct and concrete material that creates the spiritual values of people but also is " the internal means of the process of creating material cultural values " [26, p.30].
In the history of psychological development, cognitive activities have always been organized according to the principles of inheritance and adaptation. In that process, without the support of language, it would be difficult for people to summarize into generalizations, experiences, inherit achievements and pass them on through generations. In this aspect, language not only promotes its characteristic cognitive, thinking or communicative functions, but it has also truly become an important tool in continuing to inherit, preserve and create national literature and culture. It promotes the process of cultural development in a comprehensive way. Looking back at the two systems of Han and Nom scripts in the history of the development of artistic language of classical Vietnamese literature, we can see that the role of words and materials with specific cultural origins has played an important role in forming the aesthetic depth of the work. If the system of words originated from culture, learned literature helped poets to exalt, generalize, and sanctify moral, political, and social values, present and highlight the concepts of Confucianism, Taoism,
Buddhism... the system of popular cultural materials can help poets express their feelings through words and concepts that are specific, easy to understand, precise, clear, descriptive and express the national spirit in the most subtle way. These two systems have created a unique appearance, reflecting in the most flexible way the close blend of the two systems of scholarly and popular cultural materials of classical Vietnamese literature.
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It can be said that language has played a great historical mission in the process of transformation, change, and inheritance of culture. It promotes cultural development both superficially and deeply, and is the clearest manifestation of patriotism and national spirit. On the surface, changes in language follow social laws, contributing to creating significant cultural breakthroughs.
1.2. Cultural data in the artistic language of classical Nom stories
1.2.1. The concept of cultural material in the artistic language of Nom stories
learned
Within the scope of existing documents, in our opinion, cultural material in the language of classical Vietnamese literary works is a system of words originating from scholarly and popular culture, with vivid semantic expression, contributing to the formation and reflection of the artistic world of the work and the ideological and cultural-artistic characteristics of the artist .
Nom stories, also known as Nom poetic stories, Nom stories, poetic stories ... are an endogenous genre in ancient Vietnamese literature. According to researchers, along with stories written in Chinese characters, Nom stories may have appeared in the 16th century and developed strongly from the 17th to the 19th century. As a national genre, Nom stories were dominated by the concept of class in medieval literary genres and the content was somewhat beyond the rules and etiquette of the time, so the ruling class at one point banned the circulation of this genre.
From the perspective of origin and nature, the Nom story system in Vietnamese classical literature is temporarily divided into two basic types: scholarly Nom stories and popular Nom stories . However, in terms of creative force, the authors of Nom stories
Most of them were intellectuals who had passed the imperial examinations or were scholars who lived in seclusion. The themes and subjects of popular Nom stories were often taken from folk tales or were self-composed. These poetic stories were often anonymous, perhaps the authors did not think of leaving their names or were anonymous because they were banned. But there were also famous stories whose authors were famous intellectuals. There were also Nom stories that were certainly composed by literati, scholars, and highly educated Confucian scholars, but for various reasons they became anonymous. Most of the learned Nom stories were works that were translated into the national language from classical Chinese literary works. Many stories
Nom was used by wandering artists to tell poetic stories such as Hoa Tien花箋, Song Tinh Bat
Night poem , Luc Van Tien poem , So Kinh Tan Trang poem ... and especially Doan Truong Tan Thanh poem (commonly known as Truyen Kieu poem ). Along with a number of other genres such as Nom Tang poetry, Khuc Ngam Song That Luc Bat, Hat Noi poetry...
Nom poetry has contributed to enriching the spiritual cultural heritage of the Vietnamese people. Using Vietnamese writing and poetry and promoting human rights, Nom poetry shows the trend of nationalization and democratization thanks to its unique form of expression, with humanistic content and progressive society.
Life around us is full of wonders. Things and phenomena, from simple to complex, all have a reason for their existence that not everyone can explain, and it is even more difficult if it is the cultural meaning of words. Sometimes, we have to guess, but sometimes we also need to explain thoroughly to understand their richness in classical culture and literature. The meaning of the cultural materials that we mention here is the content, meaning, and cultural imprints that are reflected and expressed through the relationships and impacts of those meanings on the process of communication and the creation of literary language by writers in their works.
As presented, based on geographical, historical and linguistic conditions, the two neighboring countries Vietnam and China have had a very long-standing relationship and cultural contact, the influence of Han culture on Vietnamese culture is a very noteworthy feature. However, the preservation and development of these characteristics
Having the specific characteristics of Vietnamese culture is also an essential need. In the process of development of Vietnamese culture, the reception of foreign culture and the promotion of positive elements of indigenous culture, the creation of new elements suitable to the characteristics of the nation are always shown in many areas of life but most specifically in language, more specifically in the Sino-Vietnamese and pure Vietnamese vocabulary.
In the Sino-Vietnamese word system, the issue of retaining the basic meanings in Chinese (ie original meaning, real meaning) is a common one. However, it is not only an influence, complete absorption but also in our language usage habits there has been creativity, change (ie the process of semantic derivation, also known as borrowing forms of expression to express new layers of meaning). For example, the word
Phuong Phi芳菲in Chinese means " fragrant ", a word used for flowers and grass.
But when it entered the Vietnamese vocabulary, it meant “ plump, good and fat ”, used to refer to good health. The word “tứ tế ” in Chinese means “ meticulous, thorough ” but is used by Vietnamese people to mean “ treat each other well ”. The word “thước pháp” in Chinese means “ method , way ” but today Vietnamese people often use it to refer to “ bad ways or schemes to achieve a goal ”. Vietnamese people use the word ma thuong馬 上(heroic horse) to refer to a person with heroic spirit. In modern Chinese, the meaning of ma thuong is " immediately ", " right away " like the poem Liangzhou Ci涼 州 詞by Wang Han王翰(Thinh Duong) which has the line: "Drinking peach wine, night light cup, duc am pipa ma thuong thoi", Nguyen Tuyet Han has temporarily translated it as: " Drinking peach wine, night light cup, duc am pipa ma thuong thoi", Nguyen Tuyet Hanh has temporarily translated it as: " Drinking peach wine , night light cup, duc am pipa ma thuong thoi ".
in the luminous cup, about to drink, the sound of the pipa urged him to mount his horse " and the translator affirmed
Definition: " The word "ma thuong" in this poem is almost always translated as getting on a horse. Get on a horse.
"horse" must be "thuong ma" or "thuong ma" and cannot be "ma thuong" which means immediately like ma thuong tau馬上走(go immediately) " [08, p.91]. Of course, this is also a reasonable understanding. However, when analyzing the semantics of
Regarding this verse, we completely agree with The Anh's explanation:
"Ma thuong" does not mean getting on a horse, but understanding it in the vernacular sense like author Nguyen Tuyet Hanh is not quite right... The problem here is really
It turns out that it is related to a cultural feature of the Hu people in the Western Regions (now part of the Xinjiang Autonomous Region) which is “sitting on horseback to play the pipa”. Therefore, “ma thuong” must be understood as “sitting on horseback” and “pipa ma thuong” is considered a fixed phrase to indicate that cultural feature [08, p.91].
Through the above example, we can see that to understand the semantics of words, especially words in classical poetry, requires readers to have a certain cultural capital, which affects their behavior and reception of classical literary works, especially classical Vietnamese literary language. In addition, readers need to understand the correlation between popular cultural language and learned cultural language. These two systems always maintain a certain distance, always standing in a separate class with an ancient, solemn, learned, elegant and specific, precise, and vividly expressive style.
From a historical perspective, the study of cultural meanings and the determination of the conceptual connotation of cultural meanings of words is a methodological work, helping us to have more accurate explanations of the semantics and functional style of words. In particular, in the study of medieval literary works, the use of cultural material as a tool concept has provided readers with in-depth approaches and contributed to suggesting symbolic cultural meanings in classical literary language.
1.2.2. The system of cultural materials in the artistic language of Nom stories
learned
As analyzed, before the innovation and expansion of the scope of the survey object based on interdisciplinary principles, language researchers have paid attention to issues related to culture, cultural dialogue between peoples of different regions, especially in the fields of communication language and literature. This has led to the birth of a new, independent science, which is Cultural Linguistics, appearing at the intersection of language and culture.
Until now, we have often used the concept of cultural identity.
culture , cultural journey , cultural contact as instrumental concepts for assessment
about the cultural character of a particular work or a certain literary period. Language is an important " conduit " of culture, a component of culture. For example, studying Buddhist terminology, viewpoints, and philosophical thoughts without studying Buddhist culture is like " touching a torch on a tray " (Mon Chuc
It is difficult to grasp the philosophical meanings of the system of thought .
This idea. These are also the difficulties that we have to solve when doing this topic. In fact, there has not been any work that defines the cultural meaning of words in a systematic and complete way, but in the process of its function, cultural material has entered literature naturally, creating rich and polysemous nuances for the language of the work, especially the Tale of Kieu .
In the history of Vietnamese literature, the system of cultural materials in classical literary works is an artistic code that needs to be analyzed and interpreted. It includes a system of euphemisms, elegant language or conventional language forms originating from genres such as: Poetry and prose of the Han - Wei, Tang - Song dynasties in particular and classical Chinese literature in general. Besides, it is also a layer of words derived from Vietnamese culture, folk literature, from folk experience through idioms, proverbs or the system of empty words, reduplicative words in Vietnamese. It can be expressed through indirect forms and linguistic forms, but it is a direct factor in creating the elegant, simple appearance, polyphony and polysemy for the work. In particular, this layer of words has demonstrated a level of understanding and absorption of Chinese and Vietnamese culture as well as the depth of life experience that the poet wants to convey in his poetry. When expressing his ability to generalize about the life and fate of talented but ill-fated women, Nguyen Du wrote:
" The flower blooms outwards"
A lifetime of talent, a tragic fate ...
(Sentence 415 - 416)
The poetic materials of heroism, ill-fatedness, talent ... in the above verses are both elegant and typical, and have a general philosophical character, helping the poet to present his own reflections on human destiny, especially
especially talented people. These are words that have been influenced by Confucian, Buddhist, and Taoist doctrines with a strong metaphysical quality, reflecting some limitations in the perception of human life, the nature of the era and the author, but they express a profound semantic dimension, a cultural consciousness that a medieval author needs to be equipped with on his artistic path.
Besides, in the artistic language of the learned Nom story, the expressive function of the materials mentioned in the excerpt is specialized, describing specific concepts of life according to the ancients' point of view and the bitter pains that people have to endure in their lives. It is not only a generalization about culture but also a literary technique that increases conciseness, elegance and demonstrates the author's erudition on the issues of life and art, ensuring compliance with the principles of classical poetics. Or it can also be the popular but also very literary words of the artist, such as in some of Do Chieu's works. Going deep into the world of artistic language of Nguyen Dinh Chieu in general and Luc Van Tien in particular, we can see that his folk vocabulary is very rich. Many idioms, proverbs, and folk songs are skillfully and skillfully used, making Do Chieu's words close to the speech of the masses. Interspersed in Do Chieu's poems are familiar idioms: fate is as cruel as lime, morning comes, evening disappears, life is like death, playing the lute to a buffalo's ear, water stirs a duck's head, frogs sit at the bottom of a well, meat and fish aplenty, absent-mindedly, all indifferently, greedily abandoning the lamp, looking for worms in the leaves, hanging a goat to sell a dog, sad wind and sad rain ... Or there are types of names used according to folk metaphors: rising like a storm, pain like a gradual process, guns exploding like popcorn, bullets flying like rain, hating barbarians like farmers hate grass, more chattering than monkeys, two rows of tears like a tilted water bottle ... are all very unique and distinctive ways of speaking of the people of the South. This proves that the poet has clearly shown his cultural mettle and patriotism when using the very familiar ways of speaking of the masses in the Southern cultural area in his works.
Reading Do Chieu's poetry, we also come across verses created from folk songs:
Everyone in life, if they are upright and have bad character, they will die and be haunted ( Luc Van Tien )
Similar to traditional folk songs: The upright die and become ghosts, The flirtatious die and are taken to the fields . The sound of folk songs seems to linger in Do Chieu's poetry: Oh lotus, you are a lotus with a reputation that is not cowardly, Seeing the lotus in trouble, I feel sorry for the lotus ( Duong Tu Ha)
The image of the lotus, " The Lotus is Not a Humble One" evokes the association with the folk song
familiar to the people about the noble flower: Near the mud but not smelling of mud . Many lines of poetry from Do Chieu: Every afternoon I remember the afternoon, I feel so sorry for the country ( Tu thuat自述II), Even if I remember the old story ( Luc Van Tien ) very much
Similar to the familiar lullabies of the masses in the South: In the afternoon, the ducks call in the afternoon; If the wooden bridge is nailed; If the lover wants to stop... Through the above examples, we can feel the simple and rustic style of folk songs but at the same time be captivated by the attractive and profound subtleties of the words and aesthetic ideals of the Confucian scholar Nguyen Dinh Chieu.
Or in the process of examining the language system of the work So kinh tan trang梳 鏡 新 妝by Pham Thai范 彩, we found that there are 86 allusions inserted into the author's narration and description. The allusions in the author's narration are very diverse in content.
content, suitable to the development of the plot. It can be said that the majority of the allusions in the author's narrative are about family background, career, talent, love, marriage, etc. Original Sino-Vietnamese allusions and Vietnamized (translated) allusions account for the majority. For example:
“On the Truong porch, orchids and lilies bloom, The iron zither has harmonized many times. The Pham Duong also dreams of destroying snakes, Five or three poems praise, the peach blossoms are suspicious.
Late night dream of sadness,
The soul is also sometimes moved.
Repair a burial site,
Ham Thu weaving phoenix is very quintessential…”
( Renovation , verses 53-60)