About the Book
Of the twelve short stories appearing in Hà Nội at Midnight, ten are appearing in English for the first time. Bringing to life the full range of Bảo Ninh's inventive and poetic language, Quan Manh Ha and Cab Tran are granting to English readers Bảo Ninh's first book-length work since The Sorrow of War.
Hà Nội and Midnight delineates the complex outpourings of war and the way it remakes our relation to each other.
Bảo Ninh's stories accentuate the gamut of human emotions: nostalgia, anguish, desolation, melancholy, poignancy, and hope. His stories wistfully render pre-war Hà Nội, its peaceful alleys and streets, its courteous residents, and the cozy atmosphere when family members, neighbors, and friends gather around a fire or converse in a coffee shop, as in "Hà Nội at Midnight" and in "Reminiscences."
Juxtaposed with this tranquility and geniality are the abandoned areas and defoliated forests occasioned by American bombardment and the American use of Agent Orange, as in "An Unnamed Star" and "A Farewell to a Soldier's Life." Images of polluted rivers and streams, the war-torn sky, the pungent air filled with the stench of decomposing human corpses, and the deafening roar of helicopters and bombers hovering in the gloomy sky dominate the settings of Bảo Ninh's stories.
Intertwined with these horrific images are human tears shed during farewell ceremonies, when recruits are separated from their loved ones, when parents live in anxiety and hope at home while their children are fighting in a war in remote regions, and when soldiers bury their comrades and burden themselves with their fallen comrades' unfulfilled wishes.
About the Author :
Bảo Ninh, Vietnam's most internationally renowned writer, is known primarily for his novel The Sorrow of War (1994), which has been translated into several languages and published in more than twenty countries, winning numerous international awards. Quan Manh Ha is professor of American Literature at the University of Montana. His research interests include multiethnic US literatures, Vietnam War literature, and literary translation. He is the translator of Other Moons: Vietnamese Stories of the American War and Its Aftermath (Columbia UP, 2020) and Luminous Nights: Pioneering Vietnamese Short Stories (La Frémillerie, 2021). Cab Tran was born in Vietnam and emigrated to the United States with his parents during the diaspora. He holds an MFA from the University of Michigan Helen Zell Writers' Program. His fiction has appeared in Vagabond: Bulgaria's English Monthly and elsewhere. He lives in Portland, Oregon.
Review :
"Bảo Ninh . . . makes a long-awaited reappearance in English
translation in this new short-story collection, speaking to literature's power
to unite people, both in the collaboration necessary for translating and
publishing it, and in its ability to speak directly to the ephemeral beauty and
terror of the human experience. Dedicated to his comrades, Hà Nội at
Midnight represents twelve of Bảo Ninh's most highly regarded stories,
published in Vietnam between 1987 and 2013, ten of which have never appeared in
English. Taken as a whole, these stories show the different ways that war
alters people but also poignantly communicates that life continues, in all its
complexity, in the midst of war." --Janet Graham, University
of Nebraska at Kearney, World Literature Today, March 2024
"In this 2023 collection, the twelve stories Bao Ninh selects (most
newly published in English with two stories re-translated at his request) evoke
both deep sorrow and timeless longing. . . . [The] graceful
translation brings alive these universal stories that probe the deep sorrow of
war and its aftermath, even as they touch our hearts with longing and hope. . . .
Ha Noi at Midnight is a collection of powerful stories that seeks to
take a stand against war by writing about peace--about reconciliation and the
human journey toward redemption. Read [this book]. In the face of unending sorrow, these stories
retain the power to work miracles." --Thomas G. Bowie Jr., War, Literature & the Arts: An International Journal of the Humanities
35 (2023)
"Hà Nội at Midnight is a collection of short
stories by the acclaimed Vietnamese writer, Bảo Ninh. Ten of the twelve stories
in this outstanding new collection are published in English for the first time.
They were written over a 25-year period and serve to humanize the people on all
sides of the war." --Bill McCloud, The VVA Veteran
"Hà Nội at Midnight is a reflective examination
of the war and its impact on those it ensnared. Containing ten stories written
over the past forty years, the book explores a Vietnam environmentally,
materially and psychologically decimated by conflict and its wake. The implied
question throughout: How does one go on after enduring the horrendous? It's a
matter that extends beyond war, and that can be appreciated by anyone who has
suffered trauma or profound loss." --Nick Hilden, The Washington Post
"Hà
Nội at Midnight is a
gut-wrenching but valuable read, focusing on universal experiences of war." --Kate Padilla, Authorlink
"[In Hà Nội at Midnight] deeply felt stories illuminate the interior landscape of a postwar country and the emotionally
damaged lives of its soldiers and civilians." --Alan Chong Lau, International Examiner
"Several stories in the collection lyrically yet unflinchingly revisit the anti-heroic themes
explored in The Sorrow of War, such as loss of innocence,
survivor's guilt, and postwar trauma, while others reflect Bảo Ninh's keen
observation of civilian life that encapsulates both the stoic gentility of
Hanoi during the war years and its striving postwar atmosphere." --Thuy Dinh, Asymptote
"The twelve stories in Hà
Nôi at Midnight are deeply personal, exploring ways in which war can shift
relationships, to each other and to ourselves. 'The Secret of the River' tells
the heartbreaking story of how floodwaters dismantled a family; 'Beloved Son' is about a mother writing to a son who will not return home; in 'An Unnamed
Star, ' a railroad signalman with dementia waits for a train that won't come.
Each story, shifting through time and tense, brings readers into a new and
unforgettable lived experience." --Michelle Kicherer, Willamette Week (Portland, OR)
