follow what you want, follow your secret instinctive desires, but if you go beyond its limits, it will become bad, become selfish. There are times when the writer writes with deep sympathy, that is when he sees " completely naked girls with loose hair, exhausted faces, and tilting their heads back laughing" The survivors of Laughing Forest. There are also times when the writer talks about sexuality as a sacred realm full of respect, that is when it is the result of love, a combination with the love between Nhue Anh and Tu Lo. Sometimes the writer writes with a critical attitude when instinct becomes unholy in the girls of the Huong Dem restaurant in the story Blood of the leaves , the beautiful waitress at the Queen restaurant in The sound of the night heron, the widow in the commune council in the story Phuc Loc Tho len troi or the amateur prostitute named Tram in Mat mien tay ... The prostitute out of date in The Sea of Salvation is shown to be pitied by the writer when she seeks out the lighthouse guard on the deserted island, partly to satisfy the man's cravings, partly because she wants to find support, a helping hand to save her in the last days of her life. Vo Thi Hao even felt the self-respect of that poor girl when she felt humiliated before the man's cold, contemptuous eyes.
Along with the expression of women's instinctive desires, the character's lustful gaze sometimes permeates the scenery, as in Foamy Land, Ghost Butterfly Night, Love Garden, Cold Fire, Wild Man, Cold Palace...
Vo Thi Hao writes about secret instinctive desires and cravings, not as gentle, discreet and sentimental as in the stories Tan Cang, Phu Thuy ... by Nguyen Thi Thu Hue and not as bold, intense, meditative, full of poignancy and hidden meaning as in Bong De, Tinh Chuot ... by Do Hoang Dieu... Writing about sex, each writer writes in different ways and
Maybe you are interested!
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Female characters in Vo Thi Hao's works - 14 -
Historical themes in Vo Thi Hao's writings through the novel The Burning Platform - 3 -
Gender issues and feminist resonances in contemporary Vietnamese prose through the works of some typical female writers - 21 -
Assessment of the Current Status of the Policy on Developing Female Human Resources in the People's Public Security Force -
Muong cultural identity in Ha Thi Cam Anh's works - 13
To some extent, they have gradually asserted their gender's voice in literature. However, in the process of affirming the female ego, writers can describe sexual pleasures, but that does not mean that sexual solutions are the only way to liberate the individual. It is necessary to see sex as both an instinctive activity and a cultural meaning. Therefore, in literature, sex must appear as a cultural element and writers can express human problems artistically through sex. A society that liberates individuals, liberates people with the desire to live truly themselves, that society is progressive, but when it goes too far, it will create a ridiculousness, affecting the culture of living. Vo Thi Hao has built characters who dare to live truly themselves. The writer both defended and praised the sacred rights of human beings and at the same time wanted to suppress the unjust attitude of Eastern society when considering women as mere tools in the hands of the opposite sex. Vo Thi Hao talked about sexuality as other female writers talked about sexuality, they also wanted to affirm the values of sexuality in the perception and instinctive desires of women. Through sexuality, it requires a thorough respect for women.
Chapter 3
THE ART OF BUILDING FEMALE CHARACTERS IN VO THI HAO'S WRITINGS
3.1. The art of describing appearance
In Vo Thi Hao’s opinion, women are always the crystallization of all pure and innocent beauty. When depicting the appearance of women, the writer always pays attention to observing and focusing on describing the details that characterize their external features such as body shape, face, hair and eyes… that is where the essence of women is most easily recognized.
Vo Thi Hao also shows that she has a special talent in portraying the appearance of characters, because right from the appearance of the character, she can create a special impression, a haunting impression in the reader's mind. Most of the female characters in Vo Thi Hao's works also create such an impression on the outside. They are people with miserable, miserable, and tormented fates. That painful torment of fate is partly expressed through the wrinkled features of the character's appearance, typically Mrs. Diem in The Water Carrier . She appears distorted like her fate: " Mrs. Diem's figure is small and frail, her face is wrinkled and thin, with only two eyes, she walks and sways her hunched back". Even her shoulder pole creates a great haunting obsession for the reader because " The shoulder pole never leaves her frail shoulders... it is smooth and shiny. Even the scars were smooth and as ageless as its owner. It was carved from a curved bamboo trunk marked by the wind and was born only to welcome her frail shoulders . Indeed, it and its owner were a unity of misfortune.
Or the character of the nun in The Bell Echoes at the End of the Afternoon is a woman with an unfortunate fate. Becoming a nun, breaking the precepts, being despised by the world, having to live a life of solitude.
Huong hid in a deserted temple and died in a foreign land, described by the author: " A strange face with a shaved head, falling out of the brown temple scarf. Sunken cheeks with a golden, smooth skin on the sharp cheekbones. A nose that was raised like a witch's nose" . Ngan in the story " The Day I Didn't Suck My Fingers " is a miserable woman portrayed with: " Long black eyes always looking down. A gaze as silent as the surface of a well ... a back as thin as a rice leaf... thin and weak, but she was a weak snail's intestine that had to carry a heavy shell, dragging on and on, dragging on and on without stopping"... Tuynh in "Weaving Grass" is an unfortunate woman described with " her eyes were closed and patient ... and her fingers were crooked and black". Her whole life was hard, miserable, but poverty, illness and misfortune always followed her: " her clothes were more and more torn, her back was hunched, her hair was bald like an old fighting cock, she had a chronic intestinal disease that had no cure. Then Tuynh died in bed, skinny like a salted fish"... Thus, with just a few details describing her appearance, Vo Thi Hao showed readers that those female characters appeared vividly, full of hardship, misery, and misfortune like their own fate. But besides that, there were women portrayed by Vo Thi Hao with peerless beauty, the writer used the most beautiful and "most expensive" words to evoke their beauty, that is Miss Nhue Anh. Vo Thi Hao was very subtle in letting the image of Nhue Anh gradually appear through the eyes of Tu Lo, her passionate lover, and especially shown on the beauty lantern: " the contour going through the chin and the two earlobes is not soft" , the beauties considered to be the most beautiful of the time always had to have a round chin and a face as full as the moon "but her chin with a strong contour is strangely in harmony with her long eyes like two fluttering brush strokes sketched by the inspiration of a calligrapher, turning into two unfathomable deep rivers. Half sad, half happy
The corners of her eyes were like water. Dominating her haughty, shining eyes were the hard-to-fade eyebrows that seemed to be slightly furrowed, heartbreaking . But that was her charming furrow that burned people's hearts" [15]. After the turmoil of Tu Lo's family, he chose the abandoned temple as a hiding place to avoid all uncertainties, nurturing his will to wait for a chance for revenge and here the image of Nhue Anh once again appeared through Tu Lo's eyes: " Her delicate chin was a bit heavy from crying a lot, the strands of hair were disheveled and messy in front of her forehead, hanging in curls on her temples, matted with tears, making her look even more charming"... [15]. Tu Lo was even more heartbroken when he looked at his fiancée and if his father had not died at the hands of Dai Dien and Dien Thanh Hau, that heartbreakingly beautiful face and that heavenly body would have been forever by his side and forever his... As for Ngan La, she was shown through a stunned look when: " seeing her entire naked body in the mirror ... her gray-brown cat eyes opened wide in shock under her soft, curved eyebrows that rose like two swallows' wings. Her plump, dark ochre-colored lips opened wide in surprise, revealing her jet-black teeth. Her long hair, nurtured over twelve years, flowed down half her back, hugging a slender shoulder, smooth and silky brown. Her newly sprouted breasts were like half moons with two stubborn and proud small nipples. Far away down there, also smooth and flowing like silk, were her thighs and long, slender legs with five small, slightly splayed toes and yellow toenails" [15] ... She appeared specifically with every detail, every line. Through the eyes of the nun of Tram cave, Ngan La appeared as: “ a graceful palace maid in a pink dress. Her eyes were as dark as a sea with brown pupils like those of a wild cat. Her lips were as full as the color of ochre. Her silky hair, not tied up, flowed down her slender shoulders. Behind the thin gauze, her purple navel appeared and disappeared following the proud steps of a wild horse” [15]. “Her face was full of loneliness, so far away in this world… where did this person appear in the myriad of places?
The people around her also became invisible, formless, just like her fragile and ephemeral beauty, like mist, like condensed snow, was also a powerful force that stirred up the storms throughout her life" [15]. It was not by chance that Vo Thi Hao sketched the physical beauty of these two female characters as if they existed, as if they did not, both real and illusory, as if that beauty did not belong to this mortal life, it was beautiful and so fragile like their fate. Not only Nhue Anh and Ngan La were given special favor by the author when sketching their images, but the beauty of other girls was also given great attention by Vo Thi Hao, such as: " a girl about eighteen years old, tall and slender, with smooth shoulders and high cheekbones shining with a layer of bamboo shoots like a layer of mist. Red betel lips. Eyes wide open and clear like those of a calf" [15]. That was the beloved daughter of the village chief of Quy Vu. She was beautiful, but that beauty was as fragile as her fate. Queen Mother Y Lan is described as having a “ face as round as the full moon, eyebrows like silkworms, a nose like a hanging honeycomb, and prominent bones even though the maids skillfully covered it with a layer of peach-colored powder. The Queen Mother wears a hat embroidered with Nine Dragons Feasting on the Moon, her hair is tied with a pair of golden pins with the word Longevity made of precious jade. She wears a robe woven from eight-stranded bean silk embroidered with dragons. Her Siamese dress is also woven from eight-stranded white bean silk embroidered with phoenixes” … “She is a woman of intelligence, brilliance, and power during the years of taking over the country’s politics to fight the enemy and pacify the southern lands on behalf of King Thanh Tong” [15]. It can be seen that she is not only a beautiful woman but also very intelligent and talented, a special historical figure revered by the people as a deity because of her great contributions to the nation. But in the novel The Burning Pyre , this historical figure has gone through a layer of legendary mist to become an ordinary, even ordinary person with an extremely strong desire for power. That desire was not only her passion but also her instinctive thirst: " I want to be the only one in the world. I have made the Holy One
The emperor must be infatuated, respected and obeyed. I always want to command the only person who holds the world in his hands"... [15]. Because of that ambition, she used all kinds of insidious and cruel plots and tricks, eliminating and destroying all those who stood in her way, even unintentionally... Because of her evil deeds to achieve that desire, during the last years of her life she could not live in peace and even when she died, she could not close her eyes. Thus, even though she was the most beautiful, talented and powerful woman in the world, Y Lan could not avoid an unfortunate fate because of her own ultimate ambitions, being dragged into evil acts by her desires, losing all humanity.
Vo Thi Hao's female characters not only impress readers with their austere appearance, symbolizing their miserable and unfortunate fate, but also appear with a very unique beauty of women, and the most noticeable image is the image of hair. It can be said that a woman's hair is a manifestation of gentleness, grace, softness and femininity, it symbolizes the beauty of youth. When describing a feminine beauty, the writer is deeply aware of beauty and affirms the beauty of women. That is why: " Talking about women is talking about hair. Talking about women's hair forever without getting bored". When writing about the fading of hair is also a way to express the fierceness of war, the flow of time: " Each hair is a strand of worry... Her hair is gray, but she still regrets it !". So she looked even more "With sorrow at her wavy hair flowing down her three-layered neck and pouring down her shoulders." The earthly anchor , the tiny, shiny strands of hair, yet because she loved him, she had to tear out each strand to tie it together and wrap it around his photo, hoping to keep him from escaping the earthly world...
Because hair symbolizes a woman's beauty, when sketching the fading of beauty, the writer also paid attention to describing and depicting the hair through the character of the girl in the story Broken Heart with " smooth hair and sparkling eyes".
mysterious, red lips and a curvaceous and attractive body” … but in just a moment from a beautiful girl, she ruined herself to the point that: “ her long hair fell down, leaving only a bald, messy head and a face full of black tree sap” . When depicting the gentle, feminine beauty of women because “ hair is the corner of a person ”, Vo Thi Hao cherished and respected beautiful hair, that is “ silky hair that did not need to be tied up, flowing down the slender shoulders” of the palace maid Ngan La, and “ long black hair wrapped high on the head, pinned with gold or silver pins or branches with lotus flowers still smiling and fragrant” , of the beauties selected from the North. And the “ thick, trembling hair” of two rows of palace maids kneeling motionless on the jade throne and “ the disheveled sideburns tangled in front of the forehead, hanging in curls on the temples , matted by tears, looking even more seductive” , of Miss Nhue Anh… Besides, the fierceness of war is also shown through the description of hair. The fierce war not only robbed the physical beauty from the hair of “ four young girls whose hair was only a clump of ragged hair and gradually plucked out all their hair” , but also robbed them of their youth, their dreams and their desire for happiness. Thao was the fifth girl living under the canopy of the Truong Son forest, joining the army with " long, silky hair reaching her heels" , but after only two months, " the brackish, dark green stream water" in the Truong Son forest had reduced " Thao's hair to a thin, ragged strand"... Thao was the only survivor after experiencing the war, experiencing the dense loneliness of the jungle, experiencing the border between hell and earth, returning to ordinary life. Thao appeared with " a skinny body in a military uniform, lost through pale lips, ragged hair" , making Thanh - her lover unable to utter a word when he saw her. Although she tried her best to integrate into community life, Thao could not