Le Luu's Novels in the Renovation Period

In this article, the author wishes to have a more general and comprehensive view of Le Luu's novels, thereby seeing the characteristics of Le Luu's novels in the renovation period and the writer's innovations and contributions to contemporary Vietnamese novels.

3. Topic limitation

With nearly half a century of diligent writing, Le Luu has contributed a large and rich volume of works including: 9 stories, 2 memoirs and 8 novels. However, within the scope of this thesis, we cannot conduct a survey and analysis of all of Le Luu's works, but only focus mainly on the writer's 4 typical works:

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- Distant Times (1984)

- Cuoi Village Story (1990)

- Waves at the bottom of the river (1995)

- Two Houses (2000)

The thesis conducts a survey, analysis, and study of the characteristics of Le Luu's novels, thereby highlighting the innovation, reform, and contributions of Le Luu to the novel genre.

In addition, we also surveyed Le Luu's works in the genres: Short stories, essays ... to have a basis for comparison and comprehensive evaluation. At the same time, we expanded on a number of novels by contemporary writers to compare and highlight the uniqueness of Le Luu's novels.

4. Research methods

To complete this thesis, we used the following main methods:

4.1. Method of analyzing works according to genre characteristics.

4.2. Systemic, general method.

4.3. Comparison method.

5. Contribution of the thesis

The thesis attempts to perceive and consider comprehensively and systematically to generalize the unique characteristics of Le Luu's novels in the renovation period in both content and artistic expression. At the same time, it affirms Le Luu's valuable contribution to the process of literary innovation in general and the novel genre in particular.

Through that, it is possible to clarify to a certain extent the laws of movement and development of Vietnamese novels and literature in the period of renovation.

6. Thesis structure

In addition to the introduction, conclusion and references, the main content of the thesis includes 3 chapters:

Chapter 1: Le Luu's novels in the context of contemporary Vietnamese novels.

Chapter 2: Main sources of inspiration in Le Luu's novels during the renovation period.

Chapter 3: Le Luu's novel art in the renovation period.

CONTENT SECTION

CHAPTER 1: LE LUU'S NOVELS IN THE CONTEXT OF CONTEMPORARY VIETNAMESE NOVELS

1.1. Overview of Vietnamese novels in the renovation period

1.1.1. The premises of the renovation of Vietnamese literature after 1975

After about 10 years of war, the country had many important changes. Writers of all generations thought and wrote in a new context. However, they still could not escape the demands of the organization, they still had to serve a "social symbol of truth" , a symbol with class characteristics, fighting characteristics, or at least with popular characteristics and strong national colors attached. Few writers could escape the influence of ideology. The ego of the writer, under the pressure of historical circumstances, was forced to have the mindset of raising political level in order to be able to "see the great tasks of the revolution". It was the political task and the inertia of a form of consciousness that required writers and poets to increase the topicality of literature, required them to strive to create in the position of soldiers so that the cause of building socialism would succeed. The report of poet Huu Thinh at the Third Conference of Young Writers, clearly pointed out that there are three major topics - themes that are being posed to writers: Socialism, revolution in production relations, the cause of defending the Fatherland, ideals, lifestyles... of the new generation of youth in today's life. It is possible to find not only ways to shape a socialist society, but also issues of war, revolution and productive labor on the pages of prose, poetry and literary criticism. The change of cultural context

– a turning point in society, positively impacting the creative community, marked by the country entering a comprehensive renovation process.

In early 1986, the Secretariat issued a Directive on ideological work (April 15, 1986), expanding democracy, then issued a propaganda announcement in the press about criticism and self-criticism (phase 1: May 20, 1986, phase 2: June 21, 1986).

At the end of 1986, the 6th Party Congress was held, marking the Party's innovation in thinking and perception, first of all in the concept of promoting the attitude of looking straight at the truth, correctly assessing the truth, clearly stating the truth, promoting the spirit of democracy, the people's right to mastery, fighting the inertia and conservatism of old concepts, opening a new context for creativity.

It can be said that the democratic expansion of society gives creative activities and literary criticism a great opportunity to adjust the rules of discourse. Writers have more favorable conditions than before to express their opinions, literary creation has flourished and achieved many successes.

Although there has not been a widespread discussion nor a summary on this issue, in general, writers and theorists tend to consider the period from 1986 to 1996 as a period marking innovation in modern Vietnamese literature. Of course, any change and development is prepared in advance, and this literary period is no exception. It has its seeds, experiments and lessons from many years ago, throughout the movement of Vietnamese revolutionary literature, starting with the debates on literature and art in the Viet Bac resistance base in 1948. However, the premises remain premises if they do not have the opportunity to develop.

The foundation of all innovations in literature during this period originated from the writer's self-awareness, that is, the awareness of the role of literature in society, the relationship between literature and politics, and the meaning of literature to people. Resolution 05 of the Politburo

The Communist Party of Vietnam (1987) – the only resolution of the Politburo dedicated to literature and art up to that time – opened a new perspective on the position and function of literature and art. Now literature and art are no longer simply understood as a tool of politics, a weapon of ideological work, a means of propaganda and education for the masses, but as “an important part of the ideological and cultural revolution” , “a particularly sensitive part of culture, expressing people’s aspirations for truth, goodness, and beauty, having the effect of nurturing the emotions, souls, personalities, and mettle of generations of citizens, building an ethical environment in society…”.

The relationship between literature and politics is raised and discussed openly in the press. That atmosphere helps writers to be more confident in their creative explorations when writing about complex issues of life, boldly giving their own interpretations of situations, events and personalities described in their works. Here, raising the issue of re-perceiving the relationship between literature and politics is not a requirement to separate literature and politics, as some people have thought. This awareness only helps writers understand more clearly the characteristics of literature as well as the position and mission of writers in life, advising them not to stop at illustrating slogans, encouraging movements, helping to implement the policies of the State, but to describe the fate of people, bringing people beauty, love of life as well as experience, enriching the life experience of each individual, at the same time having to study the problems of society that are happening or have receded into the past, from which to draw lessons, general thoughts, not only important in philosophy, ethics, and human life but also can have great political significance.

1.1.2. Overview of Vietnamese novels in the renovation period

1.1.2.1. General features of the novel genre

The novel is a large-scale narrative form that is especially popular in modern and contemporary times. With wide limits in narrative form, the novel can contain the history of many lives, pictures of social customs and ethics, describe concretely the living conditions of classes, and reproduce many diverse personalities. It is not by chance that the novel genre occupies a central position in the system of modern and contemporary literary genres.

Writer Pham Quynh in On Novels said: "A novel is a story written in prose to describe people's feelings, social customs or strange events that are interesting enough to make readers interested, or in other words, it is an interesting made-up story.

Novels have a great ability to recreate large-scale pictures of life, in which they contain profound issues of social and human life. That is, novels have the ability to reflect reality vividly, generalizing both breadth and depth. In fact, many writers have succeeded in their writing careers thanks to the novel genre. In the West, there are Bandak, Standan, Hugo, L. Tolstoy… In the East, mainly China, there are Thi Nai Am, Tao Tuyet Can, La Quan Trung, Ngo Thua An… In Vietnam, the novel genre also has an attraction for many writers. Big names such as Nguyen Cong Hoan, Nam Cao, Vu Trong Phung… all grew up and flourished from novels.

The structure of the novel is extremely flexible. The advantage of the genre is not only revealed in the ability to expand the boundaries of reality but also in the ability to capture and compress characters and events into a short space and narrow time... to create realistic pictures of medium and small scale. On the basis of those narrowed pictures of life, the writer has more advantages when going into the personal situations of the characters. We will encounter this when coming to the works of Old Goriot by Balzac, Anna Karenina by L. Tolstoy, Les Miserables by Victor Hugo, Living in oblivion by Nam

Cao, Distant Times by Le Luu, Fate of Love by Bao Ninh, Begging the Past by Chu Lai...

In novels, the distance between narrator and character is shortened or even eliminated. The writer can penetrate, go deep into every corner of the character's mood.

Characters are the most concentrated element of the writer's concept, expressing the writer's artistic viewpoint and style. Therefore, people in novels are people who have experienced. They are people who always think, struggle, suffer internally and always ponder over fate and life.

1.1.2.2. Overview of Vietnamese novels in the renovation period

The resistance war against the US ended in victory, the country was completely liberated. Circumstances change, people change, so literature must also change to reflect reality. From 1975 to now, Vietnamese literature has gone through 3 stages of development:

From 1975 – 1985: The transition period from epic literature inspired by romantic wartime to post-war literature.

From 1985 to the early 90s: Literature had a strong transformation, strongly influenced by personal life and world affairs.

From the mid-90s to present: Literature has aimed at artistic innovations while delving into the human psyche.

After 1975, the country was unified, peace was restored, the whole country enthusiastically entered a new period of building socialism and overcoming the severe consequences of war. From wartime life to peacetime life, with a new atmosphere, new circumstances. The urgent, hurried pace of life during the war calmed down, people also returned to normal life, returned to ordinary life with daily worries.

The process of novel innovation after 1975 began relatively early but was quietly transmitted through works: Burning Land (1977) by Nguyen Minh Chau; Father and Son and... (1979) by Nguyen Khai... It can be said that Vietnamese novels in the renovation period continued the epic inspiration of literature in the period 1945 - 1975 but there was innovation in terms of artistic thinking, creative inspiration, work structure... Novels in this period limited the idealistic view and heroization of characters. From the inspiration of generous praise, writers delved into contemplation and reflection. During this period, the personal and worldly elements completely overwhelmed the epic and heroic elements of literature in the previous period. Literature developed in the direction of re-perceiving reality with strong critical inspiration in the spirit of humanity. The innovation of literature takes place on many levels and in many genres… Among them, the novel genre is recognized as one of the genres with many achievements. The milk that nourishes novels is always real life with all its richness, diversity and complexity. However, not every life is a favorable land for novels. This literary genre develops especially in periods when society undergoes drastic changes.

With the novel Time Far Away, Le Luu is considered one of the pioneers in this innovation. Along with names such as Nguyen Minh Chau, Nguyen Khai, Ma Van Khang, Bao Ninh, Chu Lai, Nguyen Khac Truong, Duong Huong... Le Luu has contributed to creating a significant change in literature in general, the novel genre in particular. The innovation is first and foremost the innovation of artistic thinking. With the senses and sensitivity of artists, writers have explored and reflected the daily tragedies of individuals with strong sympathy and criticism. Typical works of this period such as: Woman on the Express Train (Nguyen Minh Chau); Time Far Away (Le Luu); Fallen Leaves in the Garden (Ma Van Khang); Fate of Love (Bao Ninh); Begging the Past (Chu Lai); Wharf Without a Husband (Duong Huong) have proven that.

Literature in this period shifted from reflecting positive and good things to reflecting reality in a diverse and multi-dimensional movement. The complex interweaving

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