Last Night I Dreamed of Peace: The Diary of Dang Thuy Tram | 
|  | | | Title: | Last Night I Dreamed of Peace: The Diary of Dang Thuy Tram | | Author: | Dang Thuy Tram | | Publisher: | Harmony | | Type: | Book / Hardcover | | Publication Date: | 11 September, 2007 | | ISBN / ISBN-13: | 0307347370 / 9780307347374 | | List Price: | $19.95 | | You Save: | $6.38 | | Amazon Price: | $13.57 | |
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Product Description
At the age of twenty-four, Dang Thuy Tram volunteered to serve as a doctor in a National Liberation Front (Viet Cong) battlefield hospital in the Quang Ngai Province. Two years later she was killed by American forces not far from where she worked. Written between 1968 and 1970, her diary speaks poignantly of her devotion to family and friends, the horrors of war, her yearning for her high school sweetheart, and her struggle to prove her loyalty to her country. At times raw, at times lyrical and youthfully sentimental, her voice transcends cultures to speak of her dignity and compassion and of her challenges in the face of the war’s ceaseless fury.
The American officer who discovered the diary soon after Dr. Tram’s death was under standing orders to destroy all documents without military value. As he was about to toss it into the flames, his Vietnamese translator said to him, “Don’t burn this one. . . . It has fire in it already.” Against regulations, the officer preserved the diary and kept it for thirty-five years. In the spring of 2005, a copy made its way to Dr. Tram’s elderly mother in Hanoi. The diary was soon published in Vietnam, causing a national sensation. Never before had there been such a vivid and personal account of the long ordeal that had consumed the nation’s previous generations.
Translated by Andrew X. Pham and with an introduction by Pulitzer Prize winner Frances FitzGerald, Last Night I Dreamed of Peace is an extraordinary document that narrates one woman’s personal and political struggles. Above all, it is a story of hope in the most dire of circumstances—told from the perspective of our historic enemy but universal in its power to celebrate and mourn the fragility of human life.
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Customer Reviews:
• The Other Side Of The River.... 22 February, 2008
...to use Blasé Pascal's phrase, relating to his rhetorical question concerning his right to kill another man, just because he lived on that opposite bank. Dang Thuy Tram's diaries are an important addition to that small group of Vietnamese books concerning the American War which have appeared in English, and include Bao Ninh's "The Sorrow of War," and Duong Thu Huong's "Novel Without a Name."
Alain-Fournier was another great writer whose life was cut far too short by war during the very early months of World War I. Both he and Thuy died at the same age, 27. Alain-Fournier's literary reputation was established prior to his death, Thuy's has finally come, posthumously. The strength of her diary is the immediacy and authenticity of the comments. She was quite optimistic at the beginning, but with the mounting casualties in her unit, and the relentless bombardment from the Americans, she turns more pessimistic, and foreshadows her own death. For those portions I would have given her a 5-star rating, but the frequent interjection of that leaden communist rhetoric, and the vague treatment of the personnel struggles within her unit, and the party, I decided to give only a 4-star rating, preferring both of the books above. Also, there were the issues that were only briefly discussed, and were of essential interest - her medical work. There was never an adequate description of her clinic, and the availability of medical supplies. Malaria, and what the GI's called "jungle rot," (fungal infections) were unmentioned yet must have been a significant portion of her work. She mentions in passing the poison that was Agent Orange, but again gives no real description of the effect it had on her unit.
Tim O'Brien, probably the greatest American novelist to come out of this tragic war, was in the infamous Americal Division, in Quang Ngai province, the unit that Thuy repeatedly called "the American bandits." He might have actually have been on one of the patrols that she had to face. The Americal's bases were on the lowlands, near the coast, and the mountains loomed to the West, where Thuy lived, and were a constant source of fascination and beauty - the light was never quite the same on those mountains. One of O'Brien's novels, "Going After Cacciato" explored the fantasy of one soldier finally having had enough, and deciding to walk away from the war, through those mountains, all the way to Europe. I shared that fascination with those mountains, during the same time Thuy was in them, and even had the same fantasy about walking away from the war. I was in a tank unit that spent four months, in late '68, in the next province south, Binh Dinh. One of our jobs was the road "security" of Highway 1, and on several days, we would sit, overlooking the South China Sea, at the boundary between Quang Ngai and Binh Dinh province, only 2 to 5 miles from Thuy's clinic in the hills.
Thuy spoke many times of her desire for revenge against the invaders of her country. An honest and understandable emotion from those who suffered years of misery, and the loss of so many friends. This emotion was shared by her compatriots, and has now been dissipated as they welcome American tourists to their country. I would have loved to have discussed this transformation with her in a tea house in her beloved Hanoi.
Finally, how many more diaries like this are currently being produced in Iraq?
- Reviewed by customer ID: A2YXRT2XIJIO57
• Highly Touted Bestseller In Vietnam But Not The Same In The U.s. 03 December, 2007
Dang Thuy Tram's chronicle, in its English materialization, is perhaps the only Vietnam-related book to touch all sides of that tragedy. It was difficult to keep the incredible passage of her pages, the back story, in the background of this much-anticipated war diary.
In March 2005, just prior to the 30th anniversary of the fall of Saigon, two Vietnam veteran brothers gave a nondescript and scarcely attended talk at Texas Tech University's Vietnam Center. Their presentation was about a diary penned by a Viet Cong doctor that had been kept for 35 years by ex-Army intelligence officer Fred Whitehurst, one of the brothers. His Vietnamese interpreter had advised him to spare the war booty, "Fred, you can't burn this, it already has a fire in it."
Thuy's first entries began in 1968, just after the Tet Offensive. "Operated on one case of appendicitis with inadequate anesthesia. I had only a few meager vials of Novocaine to give the soldier, but he never groaned once during the entire procedure. He even smiled to encourage me."
Unless readers can lay out the original diary next to its English brethren and are fluent in both languages, it will be difficult to determine whether the latter resembles the writing of Thuy or of the publisher's dramatic editing. The narrative is thick but raw, and only spared by entries of exuberance and jubilation by Thuy amid her combat tour to treat and support wounded Communist soldiers. "Oh, Thuy! Overcome these pains in your heart. Be joyful...You cannot live with sentiments alone, you stubborn girl? Furthermore, unless one is a Vietnam veteran, the battlefield context of time and place will be hard to comprehend. Footnotes appear on nearly every other page.
The English translation of Thuy's diary, ironically enough, was done by a former boat person who had fled Communist Vietnam in the late 1970s. He had to enlist the help of his father, a reeducated former South Vietnamese. Last but not least, there is a long introduction--a drawn-out overview of the war--by an antiwar Pulitzer-prize winning journalist.
- Reviewed by customer ID: ATFQR8X6ADJP9
• Cultural Understanding 25 February, 2008
The story behind this story is more germane to me.
It shows the common thread of conscience and patriotism that cultures & mankind share.
Neil Alexander a photographer/film maker is working on a documentary that adds a whole new dimension to this story.
[...]
- Reviewed by customer ID: A1PMYTYMO429QB
• Gripping 24 November, 2007
The following is a review of the unabridged audio edition of "Last Night I Dreamed of Peace" offered for download at Audible.com, an Amazon.com trusted partner.
"Last Night I dreamed of Peace" (translated by Andrew Pham)is the war time diary of Dang Thuy Tram, a young Vietnamese doctor in a battlefield hospital during the Vietnam War. Written between 1968 and 1970, her diary speaks of the horrors of war, her yearning for her high school sweetheart, and her struggle to prove her loyalty to her country. Above all though, Thuy's diary tells the story of hope under the most dire circumstances.
The book includes a useful introduction by Frances Fitzgerald.
The diary in and of itself is gripping and powerful, but the narration by Kim Mai Guest significantly adds to its power. Kim Mai Guest gives Thuy a voice, gives voice to Thuy's hopes, dreams, fears and disappointments. In many ways, the audio edition should be the preferred edition because Thuy's words lend themselves more to the spoken word than they do the written word.
There is no denying the book's power. There is also no denying that in the hands of a gifted director/screenwriter, "Last Night I Dreamed of Peace" could be an incredible motion picture.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A2BWZGD7S0JZQJ
• Audio Edition Is Excellent 02 October, 2008
Kim Mai Guest gives an authentic presentation of Tram's diary, making the book very accessible. I especially like hearing the names of places and people pronounced accurately and hearing the depth of feeling in the author's voice.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A1Z9L6HT5YWI8B
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