An English/Vietnamese bilingual edition of Vietnam's national poem. I bought this book for a college course.

I reserved this book for AlterEgoZoe's Asian bookbox.

I included this book in the Asian bookbox. Enjoy reading!

This book made a quick stop at my house as part of the Far East book box. Looks cool - I didn't know about this classic poem from the Vietnamese culture.

Wow this is one long poem!!
Taking this out of the box as it will work great for the Book Riot read harder challenge: translated poem. May read it during the Dewey's 24 hr read-a-thon next week.

This is a long poem which apparently is based on a Chinese novel, which tells about Kieu, a girl who was sold to pay a family debt. Time and again she was sold as slavery, as prostitute, found love, lost it, found power, lost it... As she said, she was like a floating fern, carried by the water this way and that.

I studied Chinese literature in high school, so I suppose I enjoy this more than the average reader, as I even enjoy the footnotes, which is somewhat a memory lane for me. The author uses a lot of cliches and references from Chinese history and culture, and it's fun to read again about "pear blossoms drenched in rain", "the old man of the moon", "the yellow millet dream" and all that.

However, if you don't want to bother with the tedious footnotes, the translator has taken out a lot of the hidden references, so it's easy to enjoy the poem as it is. The poem portrays the girl as a strong character and the males are all rather weak. I mean, if your wife bully your favorite concubine and you don't even dare to squeak, mmm, that's wormy...

According to the notes, this poem is actually a reference to the political situation of Vietnam at the time. Often in China, poems about the dissatisfaction of the current emperor and reminiscent of previous dynasty are often veiled as love poems to avoid censorship and punishment. Reading the notes on this allows me to look at the poem in a larger picture.

Thanks for sharing this. Most definitely not a book I'd have picked up on my own. May save this for the next round, as I don't suppose this will make for a good wild release.

I found out that there is a Paperbackswap member wishing for this book, so I decide to send it to him. This is not a wildly circulated book, and not many people enjoy reading long, old, translated poem, so I'd like to see the book go to someone really interested in it.

Hi! How wonderful you've found one of my books! Thank you so much for checking out the journal. I would really appreciate if you can take a moment to let me know you have it now. Trust me, it'll totally make my day to hear from one of my "wild" books.

Bookcrossing is a wonderful online community of book lovers dedicated to sharing books with each other and the world at large. We are also curious to see how far and wide our books can travel. I would appreciate if you can make a journal entry on this book so we know where the book has been. You don't have to set up an account.

Feel free to keep this book, return it to where you found it, or pass it on to the next reader. If you sign up as a member, you will hear from the book as it travels and gets journaled. Feel free to explore the BookCrossing site, and visit our forum to meet other booklovers. Membership is confidential, free, and spam-free. Happy reading!