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Prompt: Nguyen Minh Chau's Artistic Perspective in 'The Distant Boat'
Sample Essay: Nguyen Minh Chau's Artistic Perspective in 'The Distant Boat'
Essay
'The Distant Boat' emerged three years prior to the year 1986 - a milestone that any socialist Vietnamese writer must recall, as it marked the birth and rebirth of their artistic journey, at least in the posture of wielding the pen, they were free. Nguyen Minh Chau was acutely aware of his own needs and the needs of literature. He bid farewell to himself, pursuing new ways of exploring life from fresh perspectives and means. In 'The Picture' and 'The Woman on the Express Train,' at least, that pursuit placed Nguyen Minh Chau before a philosophical challenge: self-awareness. Awareness does not merely occur under the function of rational thinking, but it also seems to occur through the currents of the subconscious, of the deep and bright regions within the soul. Yet, it must also be noted that sometimes he was helpless to explain, to explain for the characters and to explain for reality. His characters surpass the traps of reality that he truthfully sets up, falling into a state of 'unexplainable.' Self-awareness becomes painful, becoming a wound ready to awaken. Who knows whose face in that painting represents the face of the era, the generation, of each individual; who knows if the woman named Qui is afflicted with a personal illness or of the generation, of the era...? It is not easy to draw conclusions, just as those characters, it is not easy to extinguish the flame of self-awareness within oneself, extinguishing it synonymous with burning out life.
'The Distant Boat' is part of a creative process that demands both readers and writers to reawaken to reality. Reality now is not simply a scratch on the beautiful white arm of that young volunteer girl, but perhaps, it must be a scratch in the soul. There, each individual is a repository, an owner of the scratch, preserving and storing it so that awareness will never produce an equal sign.
The story begins with Phung, a photojournalist, going on a 'hunt' for a photo of the sunrise at sea. That photo must be a work of art, of course, as he understands, it needs to avoid repetition, boredom, and familiarity. Phung leaves Hanoi nearly six hundred kilometers, 'dressed' on a beach, where traces of the war still linger: it is a battlefield. Phung's mindset is one of waiting, he befriends Phac, a smart boy in that coastal area. After nearly a week, he captures quite a few photos of fishermen repairing nets at the last dawn. But the enduring photo, the masterpiece he always desires, has not yet emerged. The art of photography, through Phung's conduct, is somewhat a gift from nature.
And then he had a sky scene for himself: 'before me was a ink painting of an ancient painter. The nose of the boat blurred into the misty white sky like milk with a hint of pink from the sun... The entire scene from the lines to the light was harmonious and beautiful, a simple and complete beauty that made me feel perplexed, as if something was tightening in my heart.' The artistic emotions that Phung welcomed before the beauty of nature truly moved us. It is the happiness, the joy of one who is always conscious and responsible for the offspring of the mind that he always nurtures. Phung fell into a state of 'trance', a state necessary before giving birth to creative emotions: 'in that perplexing moment, I thought I had just discovered the truth of perfection, discovering the moment of eternity in the depths of the soul.' In that moment, Phung was completely one with art, it was both perfection, morality, and depth, it was happiness... He was supported by it, bestowed by it, and simultaneously created it, felt it. And in an instant he 'pressed the shutter release button.' The 'supreme beauty of the external scene' captured in the lens is perhaps the moral beauty of nature. Nature, even in its most violent, most cruel state, people still capture very beautiful moments: volcanoes, lightning, tsunamis, sandstorms... Nature is its own essence. What is called 'beauty' is merely a series of agreements outside of it, created by humans.
But the story suddenly shifts in another direction, after that moment given by the sky, Phung falls into a moment, a situation 'real life' bestows upon him. From this moment on, Phung faces another challenge, perhaps even more daunting than artistic creation - the challenge of interpretation, of recognizing reality.
Before the scene adjacent to the artistic moment, Phung was amazed to the point that 'in the first few minutes, I just stood gaping. Then I don't know since when, I threw the camera on the ground and rushed over.' Phung rushes to where the man with 'a broad and curved back like the back of a boat, eyebrows burned by the sun down to two eyes full of fierceness' was using a belt to beat the woman 'tall with rough features,' 'the old man beat and breathed heavily, his teeth gnashing... But Phung was stopped by 'the shadow of a child,' it was Phac, the son of that couple. Phac snatched the belt from the man, the man 'straightened his arm to slap the kid twice.' Then the old man walked away towards the shore to return to the boat. Ending that scene, 'the sand returned to its vast and desolate look,' leaving only Phung, the boy Phac, and the sound of waves offshore, all sinking into silence...
Perhaps, it is a 'bizarre' reality. A reality so obvious that it cannot be explained. The woman endures the abuse of her husband. The husband cruelly beats his wife as a habit, indifferent and instinctive. The helpless children watch the violence unfolding before their own parents. All are silent, wandering right where the war just passed. All unfold behind the simple and complete beauty of nature. A bizarre reality intrudes immediately after the moment of happiness of the artist. A pain and suppressed pain, a peace and the destruction of peace, a shock and a silence intertwine among the myriad waves of the sea. And then, just like in the old tale, everything disappears, everything repeats...
The second time he witnessed it, Phung became a hero, he knocked down the hooligan with a blow from someone 'who would not allow him to hit a woman, even if she was his wife and willingly leaned into the tank silently for him to hit ...'. Phung, in the name of a soldier - those who shed blood to regain peace for their compatriots, right? Or does he also have an artist's 'moral' motive - someone who knows how to appreciate and preserve complete beauty rather than complete evil, forgiveness?
Phung asked Dau, his comrade who is now the district chief responsible for the area, to intervene in this case of the fishing couple. Phung's blows were just momentary reactions, he needed the voice of a judge. But in the end, both Dau and Phung were like children, going from surprise to indignation to silence in front of the woman's confession: 'This is what I say sincerely, I thank you all. Your hearts are good, but you are not businessmen... so you can't understand the difficulties of business, hardship.' It turns out, in this ugly and pitiful woman is an 'incomprehensible' reality. She endures her husband's abuse as a duty she obtained, willing for that duty. In her heart, the pain she bears seems worthy because she... gave birth to too many children. That means hunger, poverty that still clings to this family. But in reality, hunger, poverty is not just because she gave birth to many, it is also a very womanly duty. In her confession, truthful and numbing, there are questions that are not easy to answer, contradictions that are hard to explain: to love and live through myriad difficulties, sometimes one must accept cruelty, forgiveness, unethical behavior.
The husband, originally gentle and chivalrous, has been turned into a hooligan by the extreme misery of the fishing life. Is he a Hunchback of Notre Dame, a demon stepping out of that remote fishing village? Why, in this new society, where the 'great self-narrative dream' has spread into every small space of life, are there still painful, forgiving lives like that?
Is the action of the hooligan a deadlock, a release for these pitiful people? 'Whenever I felt too much pain, the old man took me out to fight, just like other boatmen drink... Later, when the children grew up, I asked the old man... to take me ashore to fight...' Clearly, this is a release in deadlock, a release full of lost water and pain.
Both Dau and Phung exclaimed: 'Impossible to understand, impossible to understand'. They couldn't understand why those two tiny people would accept to live and love in such a bizarre way. Although the woman's story somewhat helped them recognize the deep-seated memories, they still stopped at the edge of perceiving reality. They couldn't penetrate the depths of that hidden memory nor the reality unfolding before them.
Was the situation Phung encountered on this trip a setup by the writer? The writer puts characters and readers into a situation that requires understanding. But the characters failed to explain the reality, the judge's voice also became lost. They accepted it with external agreements. The storm at sea rises again, the sea churns, this fishing family may have to endure hunger again. That usual scene will happen again. 'The wolf cub' - the boy Phac, will have to wield a knife within himself to subdue his father, subdue that wretched man... Sad premonitions like scratches come and go in the soul. Souls full of darkness.
Phung had a timeless photo, hung in many places, especially in artistic families. But the obsession with the scene behind the photo cannot be erased. Behind that eternal beauty lies eternal pain. Did art conceal, cover up that forgiveness, unethical behavior? Or is art 'incomprehensible' before reality? Like the boat beyond, art can only grasp its shadow, the shadow of reality. The appearance of art, sometimes like a mist that 'blurs' our ability to perceive. Incomprehensibility becomes the despair of the artist. For the artist, the duty is to aspire to and create a complete beauty but will be a culprit if that beauty obscures and forgets the misfortunes in life. Beauty is not just ethics, it is a reflection.
Personally, Phung, Dau will not have the power to explain, end the tragedy of that fishing family. They are not enough to be the light to drive away the darkness in the souls of those tiny, suffering people. Faced with the beauty of nature, Phung fully understands. Faced with the fate of the woman, Phung is an outsider. That contradiction seems to linger throughout the creative journey of art.
Nguyen Minh Chau is hailed as the 'trailblazer and genius' of Vietnamese literature post-reform. Embracing the demands of literary innovation, Nguyen Minh Chau has revolutionized his themes, approaches, and reflections in works like 'The Distant Boat', showcasing exemplary freshness in his post-reform creations. To delve deeper into 'The Distant Boat', one can explore: Character analysis of the fisherwoman in The Distant Boat, Analyzing the humanistic values in The Distant Boat, Impressions of the character Phung in The Distant Boat, Lecturing on The Distant Boat.
