Young writers of Vietnamese children's prose today

Cao Khai An received the Cricket Aspiration Award 2020. Photo: Internet

If before 1986, especially during the anti-American resistance war, a generation of children's writers appeared with names such as Tran Dang Khoa, Hoang Hieu Nhan, Nguyen Hong Kien, Cam Tho, Chu Hong Quy, Ngo Thi Bich Hien, Khanh Chi... most of whom mainly composed poetry, then in recent decades, Vietnamese children's prose has had very bright and promising young writers. This creative force has contributed to the remarkable movements and innovations in the picture of Vietnamese children's literature over the past time, thereby establishing and affirming its position in the development of children's literature in the country.

Potential writers

The journey of Vietnamese children's literature over the past few decades has witnessed the interesting appearance and participation of writers from the 8X, 9X and 2K generations, who were still children when they wrote. Their works always bring surprises in both poetry and prose; in which, in the field of prose, there are notable writers such as Pham Gia Thien An, Cao Khai An, Cao Viet Quynh, Nguyen Binh, Nguyen Khang Thinh, Nguyen Hanh Phuong, Doan Lu Thuy Phuong, Quynh Tran... These writers do not have writing experience, but have the advantage of a purely childish perspective, way of feeling and thinking. That is something that no older writer can have more of an advantage than. Therefore, the world that they create in their works will be pure and innocent in a genuine way, expressing a creative and surprising imagination, containing gentle, natural messages, truly close to their world. Therefore, young writers have brought clear, resonant, bustling and profound sounds to the symphony of children's literature.

Among these writers, writers of Gen Z bring a new breeze to the country's children's literature. They are the generation of the internet age, multimedia technology, modern lifestyle, oriented towards the model of global citizens, very dynamic, quickly adapting to new things. With foreign language skills, they can access foreign literary works in English or other languages, and at the same time, access to translated literature has made these writers choose to write what they find interesting, specifically adventure, fantasy, and science fiction stories. This is an area that very few writers of previous generations have entered, so Vietnamese children's literature does not have many works on this topic. Their works therefore contribute to expanding the system of topics and thereby bringing new vitality to the country's children's literature.

Author Cao Viet Quynh with the work The Comet Man. Photo: Internet

Author Cao Viet Quynh with his work "The Comet". Photo: Internet

Variety in writing style

Although they are all children, the creative characteristics of these writers are quite diverse. Currently, it can be seen that their creative tendencies are divided into two branches. One is writing about the daily lives of children in close, familiar relationships with family, friends, teachers, hometown with activities such as eating, playing, studying, exploring the world around them, such as in the case of Cao Khai An with "The Story of Bap An Mo and the Straw Hill" or "Father and Son Ca Khia", "From the Letters" by Doan Lu Thuy Phuong. Second are fantasy stories, expressing the dream of a world where children are freer and have less pressure, such as “The Diary of a Naughty Alvin” by Nguyen Khang Thinh, or science fiction stories such as “The War on Planet Fantom” (Nguyen Binh), “The Comet” (Cao Viet Quynh)… It is easy to see that when writing, children use their own lives as material or use their own understanding to write about an imaginary world. This is also understandable because they cannot have other experiences outside of their own lives to be able to “engage” in thorny, unfamiliar issues like adults.

However, that does not mean that the world that the children create in their works becomes monotonous and boring. Their strength is their pure childlike perspective. That perspective will govern the way they see the world, have discoveries, explorations, thoughts, and actions that are pure and full of surprises. In fact, when entering the life and spiritual world of the boy Bap in “The Story of Bap An Mo and the Straw Hill Hamlet”, readers will be surprised by the purity, innocence, and mischief that it creates. The laughter that this work brings is true to the laughter of children: crisp, chirping, and cracking. It is impossible not to laugh at the boy's journey when riding in the car with his grandfather Dat Di, at the will he wrote for everyone, at the birth certificate for the unexpected child, or at the grandfather throwing the drum into the pond... Therefore, the children's works are not heavily didactic, although behind each story told there is always a small message.

Abundant creative capacity

Although they are children, their works sometimes surprise adults when evaluating their creative abilities. With rich, soaring, and free imaginations, many works by children writers about the fantasy world are long, showing that their thinking and expressive abilities sometimes go far beyond what adults think of them. Nguyen Binh was once called a "child prodigy" when he started writing a series of stories at the age of 10, and published 3 consecutive volumes at the age of 11 and 12. Cao Viet Quynh's work "The Comet" is also 4 volumes long, although he was only 9 years old at that time. They have changed the way adults perceive and evaluate their abilities, and at the same time encouraged writers of the same age to boldly try their hand at literary creation.

The works all express the children's views on life and the world, reflecting their own thoughts, feelings, emotions and thinking. These are works written by children about themselves and for themselves...

What is special about Gen Z writers is that they write stories (and poems) in both English and Vietnamese. There are authors who have written poems and bilingual stories (Vietnamese - English) since the age of 6, such as Pham Gia Thien An with the work "Ku Hay's First Book" (the work won the 2022 Good Book Award in the children's category), 13-year-old author Nguyen Hanh Phuong (pen name Rosy Black) with the bilingual fantasy story "Star Team: A Quest For The Greatest Power" (English title "Star Team: A Quest For The Greatest Power")... All of them live in big cities, have the conditions to be exposed to foreign languages from an early age and use them fluently like Vietnamese. From there, they have the ability to receive Western children's literature and cinema and are influenced by many things, perhaps that's why most of them choose fantasy themes or take ideas from Western literature. “Diary of Alvin” by Nguyen Khang Thinh was inspired by the work “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” (Jeff Kinney). The themes of works by Nguyen Binh and Cao Viet Quynh are also familiar themes in foreign fantasy literature and cinema.

Although they seem to be opposite in style and creative tendencies, their works all express the children's views on life and the world, reflecting their own thoughts, feelings, emotions and thinking. These are works written by children about themselves and for themselves. Therefore, when reading works written by the children themselves, readers will be able to look deeply into the children's inner selves and understand them better because nowhere else can the worldview and outlook on life of children be more accurately and truthfully reflected than in their own works. Moreover, their presence has made the land of children's literature have more special sowers, bringing colors that cannot be mixed with the works of older writers, even though the team of older writers has been playing a leading role in taking care of the garden of prose and poetry for children since its inception until now.

Source: https://baophuyen.vn/van-nghe/202506/nhung-cay-but-nhi-cua-van-xuoi-thieu-nhi-viet-nam-hien-nay-e2e147f/