Choose a brief passage from Ocean Vuong's novel, and comment on that choice, either stylistically or thematically or both.... Easy :)
(btw: this photo is taken from a lukewarm review in The Financial Times, here https://www.ft.com/content/4af899d2-7d65-11e9-8b5c-33d0560f039c)
“They say nothing lasts forever but they're just scared it will last longer than they can love it.”
ReplyDeleteThere’s something inherently heartbreaking in these words. Perhaps it’s because they hit so close to home, because I know I say that. It shows the terrifying fear that comes with commitment, the worry of being betrayed, abandoned or left behind. At the end of the day, it’s like you dread the idea of loving something for that long. “I’ll fall out of love,” you may think. “I’ll grow bored, then what?” Ocean knows what to say and how to say it, he knows how to hit the deepest concerns no one wants to voice but everyone has.
Carolina Franco
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ReplyDelete“We head home. We don’t speak. Behind the row of white town houses,
ReplyDeletea column of spruces stands motionless against a reddish sky. The beagle’s paws scrape the concrete, its chain clinking as the animal pulls us home.
But all I can hear is Paul’s voice in my head. My grandson. This is my
grandson.” (page. 65)
O excerto acima revela-nos como Little Dog se sentiu ao ser confrontado com uma expressão de afeto com a qual não estava habituado: o amor e orgulho de um “parente” por querer reconhecer esta criança como família. O facto de não estar habituado a expressões de afeto é refletido na ausência de resposta “We don't speak”, mostrando que Little Dog estava ainda a processar o que tinha acabado de ouvir “But all I can hear is Paul’s voice in my head”, como algo novo.
Desta forma, é possível identificar alguns elementos a nível estilístico que contribuem para esta ideia de sentimento, tais como: o uso contínuo do deítico pessoal “we” em “we head home” “we don ́t speak” assim como o “I” em “all I can hear”, ambos incidindo na perspetiva de Little Dog após ouvir as palavras; o uso de alguns recursos expressivos, nomeadamente a anáfora em “We had home. We don´t speak”; a aliteração em spruces stands motionless against a reddish sky” através da repetição do som “s”; a repetição em “grandson” e “my” no espaço de uma linha que surge como indicativo de valor emocional; a utilização contínua de frases curtas que revelam como Little Dog se estava a sentir, demonstrando que este estava ainda a processar o que tinha acabado de ouvir; utilização de cores “white town houses… reddish sky” para criar uma imagem vívida na cabeça do leitor; uso da conjunção adversativa “But” que revela um ponto de viragem do que Little Dog estava a ver (alienado na descrição da paisagem) para como este se estava a sentir "But all I can hear".
Em suma, a escolha deste excerto prende-se com o facto de mostrar sentimentos pouco habituais na vida de Little Dog revelando que, apesar de ser um livro maioritariamente dotado de sentimentos negativos, também existem alguns positivos que impactam não só as personagens mas também o leitor.
"There is so much I want to tell you, Ma. I was once foolish enough to
ReplyDeletebelieve knowledge would clarify, but some things are so gauzed behind
layers of syntax and semantics, behind days and hours, names forgotten, salvaged and shed, that simply knowing the wound exists does nothing to reveal it." - p. 62.
Este excerto apresenta de forma extremamente poética a dificuldade em exprimir algo tão doloroso e profundo que as palavras falham, nunca sendo suficientes. Como sempre, o narrador dirige-se à mãe através do vocativo "Ma" e do deítico "you". No entanto, mostra a sua vontade de dizer muito mais do que aquilo que é capaz, apresentando uma enumeração de motivos que provocam essa incapacidade. O narrador admite que pensava que, ao obter conhecimento e mais educação, seria mais facil exprimir-se e entender o seu passado. Aqui, a conjuçao adversativa "but" apresenta a oposiçao entre essa ideia e a realidade, a complexidade da vida que não se consegue decifrar nem explicar independentemente de conhecimentos de gramática ou literatura. Questões tão intensas, antigas e já acumuladas com outros acontecimentos, que acabam por se tornar demasiado. E esse demasiado tende a tornar-se em mágoa, trauma e simplesmente demasiadas coisas para exprimir. No entanto, tem-se consciência dessa "wound", sendo provavelmente impossível de a ignorar, mas esse autoconhecimento "does nothing to reveal it", mantendo-a escondida, tapada e abandonada.
"The truest ruins are not written down. The girl Grandma knew back in Go Cong, the one whose sandals were cut from the tires of a burned-out army jeep, who was erased by an air strike three weeks before the war ended—she’s a ruin no one can point to. A ruin without location, like a language." (p. 175).
ReplyDeleteTypically, a ruin is the decay of a structure or location. Yet, diasporic communities cannot remain bound to their physical homeland. They instead choose to retain an abstract concept of their nation with them—the invisible ruins of cultural memory.
The metaphorical use of "ruin" may then be employed here to denote loss in a war-torn country. This is one of the many techniques utilised in this novel to explore the topics of personal identity, cultural heritage, and language.
The girl mentioned has vanished, leaving only small fragments of her existence in others' memories. Like the ruin of a person, her name is now lost to time. Likewise, war has irreversibly destroyed the Vietnamese people's culture and identity.
The resulting dispersion and considerable lack of contact between Vietnamese native speakers were undoubtedly detrimental to the language. The language survived in this scenario, but there have been countless cases in history in which mass exile or forced diaspora resulted in the disappearance of cultural features such as language and national identity.
Language plays a key role in the novel, seeing as Small Dog's relatives are mostly illiterate non-English speakers. As such, Small Dog assumes the duty of interpreter but, simultaneously, risks his Vietnamese identity. He has very few contexts in which to use his native tongue, and this, along with the need to adapt to a new country, weakens his connection to the native country left behind. However, it is the aforementioned remaining ruins that constitute his identity and form the foundation for his experience as an Asian immigrant in the US. Many people endure such hardships, but these are seldom documented, and unfortunately, immaterial ruins are ephemeral until recorded.
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ReplyDelete“ As a girl, you watched, from a banana grove, your schoolhouse collapse after an American napalm raid. (…) Our mother tongue, then, is no mother at all—but an orphan. (…) Ma, to speak in our mother tongue is to speak only partially in Vietnamese, but entirely in war. “
ReplyDeleteEste excerto remete-nos para o tema da guerra e da violência, da Guerra do Vietname, onde terá experienciado violentas explosões, bombardeamentos.
Um “ napalm strike “ atingiu a sua escola e isso simboliza/ é uma imagem do fim da educação. Na vida de Rose e de muitas crianças vietnamitas existe este marco, tendo em conta a violência desta guerra, mas também de todas as guerras em geral, e a sua duração, vinte anos em que rondam os dois milhões de óbitos de soldados e civis. A educação é sempre afetada e assim também se explica a natureza de ser de Rose, enquanto mãe de Little Dog e provavelmente não só. Juntamente com todas as outras condições necessárias à vivência normal que saem afetadas. Its’ metaphore with the orphan and mother tongue is very poetic. The image that we build in our minds of her in a banana grove is also very sad. The deitic referring to her “ You “ , “Your”, to refer her schoolhouse, as usual vocative “ Ma”, “Our” to talk about their mother tongue.
I care about the education, that’s why I chose this excerpt. He’s saying that by speaking Vietnamese, or by talking about Vietnam, people will associate it only and instantly with war, and Little Dog being as he is doesn’t want that. That upsets him.
"Trevor was a boy who had a name, who wanted to go to community college to study physical therapy. Trevor was alone in his room when he died, surrounded by posters of Led Zeppelin. Trevor was twenty-two. Trevor was." (p. 178)
ReplyDeleteThis anaphor was a blunt way of describing Trevor’s life, but the truth is that, throughout the whole paragraph, we get a sense of what he was really like. Little Dog was able to choose certain aspects of Trevor’s life that make him so mundane, but so him, at the same time, which portrays their intimacy in a heartbreaking way. This leaves the reader wondering “How would he have described me if I was the one in Trevor’s place? What makes me me?”
(Ana Espadinha)
“There are times, late at night, when your son would wake believing a bullet is lodged inside him. He’d feel it floating on the right side of his chest, just between the ribs. The bullet was always here, the boy thinks, older even than himself—and his bones, tendons, and veins had merely wrapped around the metal shard, sealing it inside him.” (Page 76)
ReplyDeleteLittle Dog connects his body to the wounds of the Vietnam War. He describes the bullet as a seed, his body sprouts from this seed of pain. The bullet means war, pain, and violence. In other words, he is born with violence. No matter how much he tries to take the bullet out, this seed will always be inside him. He has no choice, the pain of Vietnam War follows him.
In the moving segment in Ocean Vuong's On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, Little Dog, the narrator, considers his connection with his mother and the linguistic obstacles that frequently stood in their way. He claims:
ReplyDelete"I wanted to say, Mom, I'm sorry that I'm only good at leaving. But instead, I said, Không sao đâu, Mom. Không sao đâu, which meant, No problem, Mom. No problem.
Because it effectively captures the difficulty and tension involved in communication across cultural and linguistic barriers, this passage is significant both stylistically and thematically. The usage of Vietnamese in the middle of an English-language story emphasises how crucial language and culture are to Little Dog's sense of self and ability to express himself.