hi my reader friends lithub has a new syllabi section that has some great (u guessed it!) syllabi from much beloved writers like ocean vuong and ross gay here's the full list that i have already added half of to my tbr:

ekphrastic poetry with victoria chang (featuring works of john ashbery, joy harjo, paul tran)

the literature of obsession with julia may jonas (obsession as transformation, destruction, catharsis and form)

place, space and landscape with alexandra kleeman (featuring didion, okorafor and hernan diaz)

lyric research with ross gay (books that combine research with an "I" like nelson's bluets or christle's the crying book)

hybrid poetry with ocean vuong (traditions, innovations and possibilities featuring bhanu kapil, rimbaud, clifton)

multigenre experiments in form with paul lisicky (for writing that explores connections between genres)

reading about writers with peter ho davies (books that teach the craft and give writing advice, think 'the outline' trilogy)

speculative women with lina maria ferreira cabeza-vanegas (a look at speculative works by women writers like jemisin, butler, k le guin)

writers and the world with viet thanh nguyen (rankine, baldwin, and coates)

sports and contemporary writing with sam lipsyte (exactly what it says on the tin)

Are you writing this month? Check out our “I wrote a novel… now what?” resources over on the NaNoWriMo website for tips on choosing your next writing adventure: whether that’s finishing a story you’ve been working on for a while, editing and revising, pursuing publishing… or something completely different! For some extra inspiration, author Viet Thanh Nguyen’s Pep Talk from this past November will help you find your voice and vision. Read the full Pep Talk here!

Image description: A purple background with illustrated pink, yellow, and purple flowers, with text that reads: “In the end, that’s what writing is really about—finding your vision and your voice, and being true to them.” —Viet Thanh Nguyen

the captain from the sympathizer, you would have loved 2024 when people talk proudly and openly about fucking the dune 2 sandworm popcorn bucket.

LEADING MAN HOA XUANDE SUPREMACY 👏���👏👏👏

What was it like to live in a time when one's fate was not war, when one was not led by the craven and the corrupt, when one's country was not a basket case kept alive only through the intravenous drip of American aid?  I knew none of these young soldiers around me except for my blood brothers and yet I confess that I felt for them all, lost in their sense that within days they would be dead, or wounded, or imprisoned, or humiliated, or abandoned, or forgotten.

Viet Thanh Nguyen, “The Sympathizer”

I asked them why they wanted to leave, and Mimi said because the communists were sure to imprison them and collaborators. They call us whores, she said. And they call Saigon the whore city, don't they? Honey, I can connect the dots. Plus, Ti Ti said, even if we're not tossed in jail, we couldn't do our work. You can't buy or sell anything in a communist country, right? for for a profit, anyway, and darling, I'm not letting anyone eat this mango for free, communism or no communism. the sympathizer - viet thanh nguyen

Read The Sympathizer, a novel by Viet Thanh Nguyen, upon recommendation by an IRL friend. It's pretty good. The best non-spoiling summary I can give of it is that it is the story of a man who spends a very long time trying to understand dialectics and eventually succeeds. That is, he ends up understanding nothing.

In interviews the author says that the framing device of the book makes the book a conversation between two Vietnamese people, and he's proud of that. Well, yes, that's ostensibly what the framing device suggests, but it's also not remotely consistent with the actual content of the book. The problem is that the book is written for Americans (non-Vietnamese) and there's no escaping that. Writing a book for Americans as communication between two non-Americans requires a degree of trust for the audience that is not on display in this novel.

It's possible there was an earlier draft that was more consistent with the framing device. It feels like you can sometimes discern its ghost, trapped behind a wall of notes in red pen reading "unfamiliar context" "Americans won't get this joke" "needs more exposition" "explain the joke or people won't know it's funny" "readers are drooling imbeciles" "needs to be more didactic". Though perhaps the didacticism is down to the fact that the author is an academic?

In any case, all of this sadly detracts from what is at the bones quite a good spy story! I like the characterization of the main character, I like the portrayal of spycraft. I like the premise, despite my objections to the execution, and I like imagining the better book trapped under consideration for the expected audience. It also made my think about my grandfather, a man who died long before I was born. I can absolutely recommend this to anyone interested in a spy novel set during and after the Vietnam War.

There's a sequel. I'll read it, I'd love to know where it's going, but I have to admit I'm a bit concerned. The end of this novel was pretty rushed, it seemed unnecessary and unmotivated. The impression I got was that the author had run out of ideas. Hopefully the existence of a sequel indicates the he has come up with some new ones.

Some animals could see in the dark, but it was only humans who deliberately sought out every possible route into the darkness of our own interiors.

Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Sympathizer

Viet Thanh Nguyen

"The gap between imagining an emotion and feeling it is the distance between empathy and experience. The divide both writer and reader face as empathy brings them closers to others but cannot make them into those others. Empathy cannot turn a son into his father and mother, even if the son is also a father" (page 50-51).

"Like Nguyen’s other books, this memoir is critical of the US military-industrial complex. His oppositional stance informs his support of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, and since the outbreak of the Israel-Gaza war, he’s been a vocal advocate for a cease-fire. Two dates on his tour had to be moved to different locations, partly because of his public position on the conflict. The cancellations underlined what his writing has sought to uncover: As Americans, Nguyen says, we’re trained “to think of wars as episodic” rather than as a continuous production of the American war machine and its long history. He’s made it his life’s mission to trace these larger connections until they are impossible to ignore."

....

“The work of dominant ideologies is to prevent people from seeing how their particular situation might in some way be related to somebody else. If people can’t see these connections, they’re trapped in their singular sorrows,” he says. “That’s not politically productive. But if you connect the singular sorrows, that becomes ever more radical.”

Viet Thanh Nguyen on refugees & immigrants

America has a distinct way of differentiating between refugees & immigrants. Author Viet Thanh Nguyen & I talk about how those perceptions affect people coming to America.

Listen to our full conversation on @spotify

nothing but respect for Mrs. Mori, she heard that squid story and decided then and there to sleep with the captain

The Sympathizer is an upcoming drama television series based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the same name written by Viet Thanh Nguyen. The series was developed by co-showrunners Park Chan-wook and Don McKellar, with Park directing for the series as well. The series is produced to air on HBO by A24 and Rhombus Media.

The series is based on the story of the Captain, a North Vietnam plant in the South Vietnam army. He is forced to flee to the United States with his general near the end of the Vietnam War. While living within a community of South Vietnamese refugees, he continues to secretly spy on the community and report back to the Viet Cong, struggling between his original loyalties and his new life.

The series will be released on Max in 2024.