Narrative thinking in historical and cultural novels of Nguyen Xuan Khanh

The result of that search brought about a cultural exchange. The collision between East and West, France and Vietnam was explained from a new perspective. There, Vietnamese culture found a way to transform and resolve different cultural sources without losing itself.

Mau Thuong Ngan is a novel that covers many issues, both historical and social (the period when the French attacked Hanoi in the late 19th century), and touches on aspects of human life and world affairs (the love story of a Vietnamese woman in the setting of an ancient village, both tolerant, bitter, and intense, " full of fertility, tragicomedy mixed with dreams and nobility " [23]) and above all, a view of Vietnamese culture and customs expressed through the lives of the villagers in a pure ancient village. Recreating a tragic historical period through the lens of culture and customs, Nguyen Xuan Khanh adds another perspective, putting forth another interpretation: the longevity of a nation ultimately comes from its cultural roots. Although it is not always expressed as direct strength, the source of a nation's identity and vitality lies in its indigenous culture that has been formed and preserved for thousands of years, and is not easily lost. Perhaps that is also the writer's interpretation of the issue of preserving and promoting national identity in the current period of deep international integration.

Carrying Rice to the Temple is a story about the Skull Temple in the Northern countryside. This is a place that witnessed many violent changes through different periods, with people with complicated fates. Both parents were killed in the raids of the French colonialists, two sisters Nguyet and An left Gieng hamlet and came to the Skull Temple hoping to take refuge in Buddhism. From the initial unfamiliarity, the temple gradually became the new family of the two sisters. Nguyet also wanted to ask to shave her head to follow the path of religious practice, but the abbot Vo Uy realized that she still had many debts with life.

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so she did not agree. Although the abbot did not accept her, Nguyet was devoted to the temple, her soul always inclined towards goodness. The boy An was different, from the moment he arrived he was welcomed by the monks in the temple. The abbot Vo Uy realized that An had a connection with Buddhism, so he agreed to accept him to follow the path of practice. Here, the two sisters, along with the nuns and everyone else, witnessed the ups and downs of the temple as well as the villagers. The enemy's outposts were increasingly dense. A tense and stifling atmosphere covered the small poor village. The enemy's notorious commanders, Captain Thalan and the Western Lieutenant Bernard, spread much resentment. Arrest, torture and death were things the villagers had to face every day. But then, somehow, thanks to the strength from somewhere, they all overcame it. Some people drowned themselves in wells, some went crazy, some had to leave their homeland... The river became a battlefield, the night was a space, each person was a guerrilla, the temple was a shelter.... In that way, the temple and the village overcame the storms of that period with perseverance, demonstrating a strong vitality.

All three novels Ho Quy Ly, Mau Thuong Ngan and Doi Gao Len Chua by Nguyen Xuan Khanh were written with many inspirations interwoven and blended together. Historical and cultural inspiration plays a leading role but always contains the inspiration of the worldly affairs of eternal human life.

2.3. Historical and cultural figures

“A writer creates characters to express his perception of a certain individual, a certain type of person, or a certain problem of reality. The main character is the one who leads the reader into a separate world of life in a certain historical period ” [14]. Researching characters, from a certain perspective, is the operation of understanding how writers perceive, interpret, and explain people, especially people placed in literary works.

chapter. Researching characters - people in works of art is also a journey of perception - discovering many new signals revolving around human life. In the genre of narrative prose, characters play a very important role. That is the vitality of the genre. The entire artistic talent of the novelist lies in the fact that, on the axis of the plot's development, the character must master all situations, all circumstances, developing according to its own internal laws. The way the novelist tells the story must be able to blend into the characters, blend into each character and its own world, telling about the character in its own language, in its own rhythm.

For historical novels, characters are the place to test and also to affirm the writer's talent most clearly. The writer from historical documents sometimes just a few lines engraved on a stone tablet, or just a name, must breathe life into it so that the character can walk, talk, express feelings, emotions to serve the writer's ideology. A successful character is a character that does not stray too far from historical documents but still has to be suitable for the taste of contemporary readers.

The characters in Nguyen Xuan Khanh's novels are closely linked to the writer's interest in the theme of national history and culture, which is fully contained in the three novels Ho Quy Ly, Mau Thuong Ngan and Doi Gao Len Chua . Nguyen Xuan Khanh has created a rich world of characters, demonstrating his masterly talent in organizing and building characters and knowing how to let the characters dominate the writing page. The author is very meticulous in organizing the lives of the characters. Each book has hundreds of very rich characters including: main characters, supporting characters, historical characters, fictional characters, intellectual characters, farmer characters, foreign characters, religious characters, etc. But each character has a clear color and outline, without being constrained or duplicated.

Nguyen Xuan Khanh's three novels carry a sense of

“interpretation” in the discourse on history and national culture. In that sense of interpretation, the image of the thesis-ideological characters has gone beyond the usual dry “statement” formula and become a very lively character model, revealing a multi-faceted view in the writer’s thoughts and perceptions as well as his views on historical and social changes.

2.3.1. Historical figures

Historical figures are people with extraordinary courage, intelligence and aspirations. Their personalities influence and change history. They are the ones who play the role of pioneers. Whether that path can be successful or not, they still represent the stature and aspirations of the nation, their names have been recorded in history. Some become heroes of the times, some fail, but they have affirmed their role in history. Therefore, their aspirations are worthy of respect. In a historical novel, this type of character is the writer's greatest effort and they contribute to creating depth of thought for the work. At the same time, it also shows the writer's research and contributes to explaining the inevitability to gain a deeper understanding of the process of historical movement.

In the novel Ho Quy Ly , Nguyen Xuan Khanh not only lifted the veil of solemnity of a stormy period of history, reconstructing history through human portraits, but importantly, he described and revived the spirit and aspiration of history. That spirit and aspiration are clearly expressed in the image of the central character: Ho Quy Ly. Before becoming a novel character, Ho Quy Ly was already a historical figure. Therefore, in building the portrait of Ho Quy Ly - the archetypal character of history that still has many controversies, Nguyen Xuan Khanh made a self-challenge. The image of Ho Quy Ly represents the type of character with the aspiration to build and reform, not based on the existing concept of history.

The novel shows the abundant creative ability and bravery of writer Nguyen Xuan Khanh, a professional novelist. The novel consists of 13 chapters, in addition to the two opening and closing chapters, chapters 9 and 10 (Minh Dao I and II) fully narrate about Ho Quy Ly, the remaining chapters focus on clarifying the world of characters in which Ho Quy Ly is still the soul and master of all the most complex relationships.

Before becoming king of the Ho Dynasty (1400 - 1407), Ho Quy Ly had entered politics thirty years earlier, in a turbulent historical context: the Tran Dynasty suppressed the rebel army of the king of the opera troupe Duong Nhat Le, installed Tran Nghe Tong on the throne, then abdicated to Tran Ngung to return to the position of Supreme Emperor. For thirty years as Grand Tutor under the Tran Dynasty, Ho Quy Ly had to steer the ship of history through the storm, while also having to deal with the members of the Tran Dynasty's royal family, the Champa army in the South, the Ming Dynasty in the North, and the people's hearts. Putting this character in a historical situation with few options, Nguyen Xuan Khanh clearly revealed the temperament of Ho Quy Ly - a politician with strategic talent, resourcefulness, and fierceness, a bold reformer who dared to think and act. In the context of the fate of the country hanging by a thread, with internal and external enemies: in the South, the Champa army advanced to fight the Tran Dynasty, in the North the Ming Dynasty was watching, the court was in chaos, after destroying the rebel army of Duong Nhat Le, his comrade Pham Su On came down to Thang Long to defend... Ho Quy Ly did not hesitate, immediately took action, and accepted all losses because: " Our country is too chaotic, we need a change, we need a reversal. Of course, it is cruel, it is painful, but we will try to reduce the bloodshed " [22; p.486].

Ho Quy Ly's ambition to change the country's situation, to keep the country peaceful and the people's hearts, viewed positively, was a democratic reform for the benefit of the people.

equal interests of all people. In this aspect, Ho Quy Ly was truly an intellectual sensitive to the times. He issued a series of policies such as land limits: forcing people with land to declare themselves, putting up signs with the names of the landowners, and confiscating those who exceeded the prescribed number. He did not want there to be vagrants among the people, so he ordered the creation of household registration books throughout the country, not leaving out any people, paying attention to managing each person, granting them land to farm... Then the slave limit policy allowed the rich to keep only a certain number of slaves, the rest were returned to their families, monks and nuns returned to secular life... In terms of purpose, Ho Quy Ly's reform policies were all aimed at concentrating human and material resources to save the country from danger. But Ho Quy Ly's mistake was that right when he issued those policies, he was clearly aware that: " Anything new is something people tend to oppose" [22; p.491], he faced fierce opposition from the Tran dynasty's nobility and a large number of monks, nuns, and Buddhists, which was the national religion that was very popular in previous dynasties.

With a strong personality, daring to face the storms, Ho Quy Ly did not give up any policy that he considered correct and appropriate. He was fiercely brutal, dictatorial and cruel in the face of historical circumstances, so everyone, from the Tran royal family to the people, hated him as a tyrant. As a man of action, Ho Quy Ly did everything to achieve his goals. He was willing to punish those who went against his will, regardless of whether they were people Quy Ly respected or people in his family that he wholeheartedly cared for and favored. Ho Quy Ly killed Nguyen Da Phuong, his sworn brother, the son of his teacher; then general Tran Khat Chan, Pham Kha Vinh, and the mandarin Tran Nguyen Hang, famous and forthright members of the Tran royal family, who had made their names in the resistance war against the Champa army and built the Western Capital. It was also Ho Quy Ly who once gave Tran Khat Chan many compliments: mature,

mature, a general who was well versed in military strategy and extremely calm... In a great intellectual like Ho Quy Ly, the spirit and historical aspiration were not only actions, but also the aspiration of a person with an inferiority complex about his race, so he always strengthened his belief in his bloodline. Quy Ly told his son Nguyen Trung these painful words: " In filial piety, the act of making ancestors proud, making the family name famous, and passing it down in history, that is great filial piety. You must always remember in your heart that you are descended from the Ho family. Changing to the Le family name is only temporary; a gentleman must also know how to accept humiliation, as long as his great ambition is finally achieved " [22; p.54].

As a wise man, always calculating everything carefully, Ho Quy Ly decided to marry his eldest son Ho Nguyen Trung to Quynh Hoa - the daughter of the mandarin Tran Nguyen Hang " he must be a relative of mine " to win over the mandarin, so that he could understand him. Even the intention to establish a new capital, a place with a difficult terrain, with its back against the mountain, was because he was witnessing with his own eyes the corruption of the Tran dynasty and asked himself: " Compared to a newly established dynasty, which was cleared of corrupt officials, which was organized firmly, which was discussed and criticized, which of the two dynasties was better and stronger?" [22; p.105]. Ho Quy Ly's aspiration was that of a politician with a spirit of self-responsibility, daring to debate with the old, the stagnant, and debate with himself to strengthen his belief in the path he was taking. The cold sobriety and the cruel suspicion of the Grand Tutor made him sink deeper and deeper into political gambling, and to realize his desire to reform the country, Ho Quy Ly accepted to step over barriers that, to him, were as painful as hurting himself and hurting others.

In complete contrast to Ho Quy Ly, the old king Nghe Ton (real name Tran Phu, third son of King Tran Minh Ton, mother is Le Thi, aunt of

Quy Ly), who trusted Quy Ly very much, was also a half-hearted figure, with the aspiration of a man who wanted to "keep the wheel of history still". When history placed on his shoulders the responsibility of taking on the Tran dynasty's legacy, Tran Phu refused because " Since I was young, I had no will to be king. My only wish was for the country to be peaceful and free from chaos..." [22; p.114]. Supported by the people and respected by the Tran royal family, when on the throne, King Tran Nghe Ton paid great attention to culture, treated scholars with respect, and sought talented people... But even though he knew that the country had many problems that needed to be changed from the root, he still did not want to do it because he was afraid of causing trouble. He only wanted to solve everything according to the traditions of his ancestors, the king had to be a model of benevolence and love for the people... During the three years he ruled, everything went smoothly because he had trusted associates by his side. But when faced with foreign enemies, the Champa army was ready to attack, he abdicated the throne to his younger brother Tran Kinh, proclaimed himself King Due Tong, and he became the Supreme Emperor. Nghe Hoang could not avoid the fierce collisions of history. The death of the old king was also proof of the decline of a weak, feeble and anxious dynasty in every step of history.

Although the historian Su Van Hoa is a fictional character, he is an important ideological character in expressing historical perspectives. The attitude of an intellectual and his choices in the face of historical twists and turns are clearly shown in this character. Throughout the novel, from his appearance in Chapter I, through many turmoils until his death, Su Van Hoa still reveals his upright and honest soul in the midst of the complex relationships between opposing factions. The character impresses readers with his profound thoughts on history: “ History is the soul of mountains and rivers. History is the essence of the country. The sooner a nation knows how to record history, the more it will have.”

Narrative thinking in historical and cultural novels of Nguyen Xuan Khanh - 7

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