Launching volume 2 of the novel series 'Nation and mountains of ten thousand miles'

The novel “Nuoc non van dam” depicts the image of President Ho Chi Minh in three important stages of his life: Childhood and youth (1890-1911); Thirty years of his “search for the shape of the country”, founding the Communist Party of Vietnam (1911-1941); The years he returned to the country, together with our Party and people, fought for independence and freedom for the Fatherland, happiness for the people, making Vietnam a symbol of the aspiration to fight for national liberation, national unification, the conscience and dignity of mankind (1941-1969).

Book launch in Hanoi.

Volume 2 of the novel series was released to the public on the occasion of the entire Party and people excitedly celebrating the 93rd anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of Vietnam (February 3, 1930 - February 3, 2023). A large number of literary and art researchers and critics; writers, journalists and readers attended this meaningful event.

If volume 3 of the novel series is completed (expected in late 2023, early 2024), this will be the first novel series to fully, deeply and vividly reflect the life and career of President Ho Chi Minh, especially the image of Ho Chi Minh, the person Ho Chi Minh, and the revolutionary path of Ho Chi Minh in contemporary Vietnamese literature.

Associate Professor, Doctor, writer Nguyen The Ky - Chairman of the Central Council for Theory and Criticism of Literature and Arts, former Editor-in-Chief of Nghe An Newspaper said that along with the 3-volume novel, there will be 3 stage plays of the same name, which have been and will be introduced to the public in Hanoi, Nghe An, Ho Chi Minh City, Hue City and several other localities.

Volume one of the novel series entitled “Debt to the Country” is about Uncle Ho’s childhood years in his hometown, in the imperial city of Hue; his youth in Hue, Binh Dinh, Phan Thiet, Saigon… Writer Nguyen The Ky not only successfully portrayed the image of Nguyen Sinh Cung-Nguyen Tat Thanh in the historical and social context of Vietnam in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, but also went into depth to explain and demonstrate the cultural, political, ideological and social factors that shaped and trained Nguyen Sinh Cung-Nguyen Tat Thanh so that he could have a historic journey of thousands of miles from his hometown of Nghe An to the imperial city of Hue to Saigon port, for the trip across the ocean to save the country on June 5, 1911.

As he later recounted, “I want to go abroad to see France and other countries. After seeing how they do things, I will return to help our people.”

Displaying volume 2 "Drifting on the Four Seas" of the book series at the Launch Ceremony.

Volume 2 “Drifting on Four Seas” depicts the image of Van Ba-Nguyen Ai Quoc in France, England, America, African countries, the Soviet Union, China, Thailand... until the day he returned to the Fatherland, January 28, 1941. Compared to volume 1, the amount of material, especially the ideology of the work, of the characters, and events in volume 2 is much larger and broader.

In France, Van Ba-Nguyen Ai Quoc joined the French Socialist Party in 1918; proactively and jointly chaired with patriots Phan Chu Trinh and Phan Van Truong the sending of the “Demand of the Annamese People” to the Versailles Conference (1919); wrote the “Indictment of the French Colonial Regime” (1920); voted for the Third International (Communist International), became one of the founders of the French Communist Party (December 29, 1920) and the first communist of Vietnam. In 1922, he founded the newspaper “The Miserable” (Le Paria), and in the first issue, he affirmed the newspaper’s mission as “liberating humanity”.

Through the pen of writer Nguyen The Ky, we see more clearly that during his years in the West, Nguyen Ai Quoc both worked hard to earn a living and longed to find a way to save the country and the people. He clearly recognized a painful and hateful truth: it was capitalism and the imperialist and colonial clique that caused all the oppression, exploitation, and suffering for workers, peasants, and other classes in the colonies and even in the mother country.

With more than 220 pages of volume 2, readers will have a thorough, systematic, and logical view of the changes in perception and thinking of a great man, in the simplest way. As simple as the way he lived throughout his life. Many events and characters in this volume are more or less known to readers, related to the revolutionary life of Nguyen Ai Quoc.

But there are also characters and details similar to the way writer Nguyen The Ky developed in volume 1, which are fictional characters. They are built naturally and sharply, using the poetics of the novel, with vivid personalities, close to everyday life in relationships with the central characters such as Van Ba, Nguyen Ai Quoc, Ly Thuy, Ho Quang, Tong Van So, Thau Chin, Mr. Vuong... Using such poetics, the personality, qualities, and beautiful soul of Nguyen Ai Quoc are portrayed in a simple, close, and convincing way.

“Lênh trôi bạn bân bien” is the fourth novel by writer Nguyen The Ky. Before embarking on this novel series, he had “Chuyen tinh Khau Vai” (stage script, 2013 and novel, 2019), “Hung dong” (stage script, 2016 and novel, 2020). He said that he advocates novelizing stage scripts and vice versa because he realizes that each genre of literature and art has its own strengths, its own tone, and its own audience.

The novel series “Nuoc non van dam” about President Ho Chi Minh is the book series that he is most passionate about, has been thinking about for a long time, and has accumulated materials very carefully and meticulously. He hopes that with this series of books, the portrait of Ho Chi Minh will once again be portrayed more clearly, deeply, truthfully and vividly - a simple and great man, beautiful and honest, who is always with us, talking to us, walking with us towards the future. He lives more truly, more beautifully, and more closely in “Nuoc non van dam” and in the books that Vietnamese literature has ever had.

Volume 3 of the novel series "Nuoc non van dam" (and part 3 of the stage play of the same name) is expected to be released to the public at the end of 2023.