Mappemonde mettant en évidence le Vietnam.

The Kim-Vân-Kiêu, or the Vietnamese Soul Unveiled

Trans­lated from French

There are works that carry within them­selves the tastes and as­pi­ra­tions of an en­tire na­tion, “from the rick­shaw puller to the high­est man­dar­in, from the street ven­dor to the great­est lady in the world”. They re­main eter­nally young and wit­ness the suc­ces­sion of new gen­er­a­tions of ad­mir­ers. Such is the case of the Kim-Vân-Kiêu1Re­jected forms:
Kim, Ven, Kièu.
Le Conte de Kiêu (The Tale of Kiêu).
L’His­toire de Kieu (The Story of Kieu).
Le Ro­man de Kiều (The Novel of Kiều).
Truyện Kiều.
His­toire de Thuy-K­iêu (S­tory of Thuy-K­iêu).
Truyên Thuy-K­iêu.
L’His­toire de Kim Vân Kiều (The Story of Kim Vân Kiều).
Kim Vân Kiều truyện.
Nou­velle His­toire de Kim, Vân et Kiều (New Story of Kim, Vân and Kiều).
Kim Vân Kiều tân-truyện.
La Nou­velle Voix des cœurs brisés (The New Voice of Bro­ken Heart­s).
Nou­veau Chant du des­tin de mal­heur (New Song of Un­for­tu­nate Des­tiny).
Nou­veaux Ac­cents de douleurs (New Ac­cents of Sor­row).
Nou­veau Chant d’une des­tinée mal­heureuse (New Song of an Un­for­tu­nate Des­tiny).
Nou­veau Chant de souf­france (New Song of Suf­fer­ing).
Nou­velle Voix des en­trailles déchirées (New Voice of Torn En­trail­s).
Nou­veaux Ac­cents de la douleur (New Ac­cents of Pain).
Nou­velle Ver­sion des en­trailles brisées (New Ver­sion of Bro­ken En­trail­s).
Le Cœur brisé, nou­velle ver­sion (The Bro­ken Heart, New Ver­sion).
Đoạn-trường tân-thanh., this poem of more than three thou­sand verses that re­veals the Viet­namese soul in all its del­i­ca­cy, pu­ri­ty, and self-de­nial:

“One must hold one’s breath, one must tread with cau­tion to be able to grasp the beauty of the text [so much] is it gra­cious (dịu dàng), pretty (thuỳ mị), grandiose (tráng lệ), splen­did (huy hoàng).”

Du­rand, Mau­rice (ed.), Mélanges sur Nguyễn Du (Es­says on Nguyễn Du), Paris: École française d’Ex­trême-Ori­ent, 1966.

The au­thor, Nguyễn Du (1765-1820)2Re­jected forms:
Nguyên Zou.
Nguyên-Zu.
Hguyen-Du.
Not to be con­fused with:
Nguyễn Dữ (16th cen­tu­ry), whose Vast Col­lec­tion of Mar­velous Leg­ends is a crit­i­cism of his time un­der the veil of the fan­tas­tic., left the rep­u­ta­tion of a melan­cholic and tac­i­turn man, whose ob­sti­nate mutism earned him this rep­ri­mand from the em­per­or: “You must speak and give your opin­ion in coun­cils. Why do you thus shut your­self up in si­lence and only ever an­swer with yes or no?” A man­darin in spite of him­self, his heart as­pired only to the qui­etude of his na­tive moun­tains. He came to curse the very tal­ent that, by el­e­vat­ing him to the high­est of­fices, dis­tanced him from him­self, to the point of mak­ing it the moral con­clu­sion of his mas­ter­piece: “Let those who have tal­ent not glo­rify them­selves for their tal­ent! The word ’tài’ [tal­ent] rhymes with the word ’tai’ [m­is­for­tune]”. True to him­self, he re­fused all treat­ment dur­ing the ill­ness that proved fa­tal to him and, learn­ing that his body was grow­ing cold, he wel­comed the news with a sigh of re­lief. “Good!”, he mur­mured, and this word was his last.

The Epic of Sorrow

The poem re­traces the tragic des­tiny of Kiêu, a young woman of in­com­pa­ra­ble beauty and tal­ent. While a ra­di­ant fu­ture seems promised to her along­side her first love, Kim, fate strikes at her door: to save her fa­ther and brother from an un­just ac­cu­sa­tion, she must sell her­self. Thus be­gins for her a jour­ney of fif­teen years, dur­ing which she will be in turn ser­vant, con­cu­bine, and pros­ti­tute, flee­ing one mis­for­tune only to find a worse one. Yet, like the lo­tus that blooms on the mire, in the midst of this very ab­jec­tion, Kiêu pre­serves “the pure fra­grance of her orig­i­nal no­bil­ity”, guided by an un­shake­able con­vic­tion:

“[…] if a heavy karma weighs on our des­tiny, let us not re­crim­i­nate against heaven and let us not ac­cuse it of in­jus­tice. The root of good re­sides within our­selves.”

Nguyễn, Du, Kim-Vân-Kiêu, trans. from Viet­namese by Xuân Phúc [Paul Schnei­der] and Xuân Viết [Nghiêm Xuân Việt], Paris: Gal­li­mard/UNESCO, 1961.

Between Translation and Creation

It was dur­ing an em­bassy to China that Nguyễn Du dis­cov­ered the novel that would in­spire his mas­ter­piece. From a story one might judge ba­nal, he knew how to cre­ate an “im­mor­tal poem / Whose verses are so sweet that they leave, on the lip, / When one has sung them, a taste of honey”3Droin, Al­fred, “Ly-Than-Thong” in La Jonque vic­to­rieuse (The Vic­to­ri­ous Junk), Paris: E. Fasquelle, 1906.. This Chi­nese fil­i­a­tion would, how­ev­er, be­come an ap­ple of dis­cord for nascent na­tional pride. In the ef­fer­ves­cence of the 1920s-1930s, it armed the crit­i­cism of the most in­tran­si­gent na­tion­al­ists, of whom the scholar Ngô Đức Kế be­came the spokesper­son:

“The Thanh tâm tài nhân [source of the Kim-Vân-Kiêu] is but a de­spised novel in China and now Viet­nam el­e­vates it to the rank of canon­i­cal book, of Bible, it is truly bring­ing great shame upon one­self.”

Phạm, Thị Ngoạn, In­tro­duc­tion au Nam-Phong, 1917-1934 (In­tro­duc­tion to Nam-Phong, 1917-1934), Saigon: So­ciété des études in­dochi­nois­es, 1973.

In truth, be­yond its bor­rowed or li­cen­tious pas­sages, the Kim-Vân-Kiêu is above all the echo of the in­jus­tices suf­fered by the Viet­namese peo­ple. “The songs of the vil­lagers have taught me the speech of jute and mul­berry / Tears and sobs in the coun­try­side evoke wars and mourn­ing”, writes Nguyễn Du in an­other poem4This is the poem “Day of Pure Clar­i­ty” (“Thanh minh ngẫu hứng”). The Fes­ti­val of Pure Clar­ity is when fam­i­lies honor their an­ces­tors by go­ing to the coun­try­side to clean their tombs.. Through­out the epic ap­pears this vi­brant, of­ten heartrend­ing sen­si­tiv­ity of a poet whose heart beats in uni­son with the suf­fer­ing that smol­dered con­fus­edly in the hum­ble mass­es, as this pas­sage tes­ti­fies:

“The reeds pressed their equal tops to the hoarse breath of the north wind. All the sad­ness of an au­tumn sky seemed re­served for a sin­gle be­ing [K­iêu]. Along the noc­tur­nal stages, when a clar­ity fell from the ver­tig­i­nous fir­ma­ment and the dis­tances were lost in an ocean of mist, the moon she saw made her ashamed of her oaths be­fore the rivers and moun­tains.”

Nguyễn, Du, Kim-Vân-Kiêu, trans. from Viet­namese by Xuân Phúc [Paul Schnei­der] and Xuân Viết [Nghiêm Xuân Việt], Paris: Gal­li­mard/UNESCO, 1961.

A Mirror for the People

The for­tune of the Kim-Vân-Kiêu was such that it has left the do­main of lit­er­a­ture to be­come a mir­ror in which ev­ery Viet­namese rec­og­nizes them­selves. A pop­u­lar song has thus erected its read­ing as a ver­i­ta­ble art of liv­ing, in­sep­a­ra­ble from the plea­sures of the sage: “To be a man, one must know how to play ’tổ tôm’5Viet­namese card game for five play­ers. Very pop­u­lar in high so­ci­ety, it is re­puted to re­quire much mem­ory and per­spi­cac­i­ty., drink Yun­nan tea and re­cite the Kiêu” (Làm trai biết đánh tổ tôm, uống trà Mạn hảo, ngâm nôm Thúy Kiều). Su­per­sti­tion has even seized upon it, mak­ing the book an or­a­cle: in mo­ments of un­cer­tain­ty, it is not rare for one to open it at ran­dom to seek, in the verses that present them­selves, an an­swer from des­tiny. Thus, from the schol­ar’s cab­i­net to the most mod­est dwelling, the poem has known how to make it­self in­dis­pens­able. It is to the scholar Phạm Quỳnh that we owe the for­mu­la, which re­mains fa­mous, that sum­ma­rizes this sen­ti­ment:

“What have we to fear, what should we be anx­ious about? The Kiêu re­main­ing, our lan­guage re­mains; our lan­guage re­main­ing, our coun­try sub­sists.”

Thái, Bình, “De quelques as­pects philosophiques et re­ligieux du chef-d’œu­vre de la lit­téra­ture viet­nami­en­ne: le Kim-Vân-Kiêu de Nguyễn Du” (On Some Philo­soph­i­cal and Re­li­gious As­pects of the Mas­ter­piece of Viet­namese Lit­er­a­ture: the Kim-Vân-Kiêu by Nguyễn Du), Mes­sage d’Ex­trême-Ori­ent, no. 1, 1971, p. 25-38; no. 2, 1971, p. 85-97.

Further Reading

Around Kim-Vân-Kiêu

Quotations

“Trăm năm trong cõi người ta,
Chữ tài chữ mệnh khéo là ghét nhau.
Trải qua một cuộc bể dâu,
Những điều trông thấy mà đau đớn lòng.
Lạ gì bỉ sắc tư phong,
Trời xanh quen thói má hồng đánh ghen.”

Truyện Kiều on Wik­isource tiếng Việt, [on­line], ac­cessed Sep­tem­ber 4, 2025.

“In a hun­dred years, within these lim­its of the hu­man ca­reer, how tal­ent and des­tiny de­light in con­fronting each oth­er! Through so many up­heaval­s—seas be­come mul­berry field­s—what spec­ta­cles to strike the heart painful­ly! Yes, such is the law: no gift that must not be dearly paid for, and the jeal­ous blue sky is ac­cus­tomed to per­se­cut­ing the des­tiny of rosy cheeks.”

Nguyễn, Du, Kim-Vân-Kiêu, trans. from Viet­namese by Xuân Phúc [Paul Schnei­der] and Xuân Viết [Nghiêm Xuân Việt], Paris: Gal­li­mard/UNESCO, 1961.

“A hun­dred years, within these lim­its of hu­man life, ge­nius and des­tiny con­front each other mer­ci­less­ly. Mul­berry fields over the sea, what spec­ta­cles to strike the heart painful­ly! Yes, ev­ery gift must be dearly paid for; the jeal­ous blue sky is ac­cus­tomed to per­se­cut­ing beau­ties with rosy cheeks.”

Nguyễn, Du, Kim-Vân-K­iều: ro­man-poème (Kim-Vân-K­iều: Nov­el-Po­em), trans. from Viet­namese by Xuân Phúc [Paul Schnei­der], Brus­sels: Thanh-Long, 1986.

“A hun­dred years, within this limit of our hu­man life,
What is des­ig­nated by the word ’tal­ent’ and what is des­ig­nated by the word ’des­tiny’, how skill­ful these two things show them­selves to be at hat­ing each oth­er, at ex­clud­ing each oth­er;
Hav­ing crossed a pe­riod that po­ets call the time taken by seas to trans­form into mul­berry fields and, re­cip­ro­cal­ly, mul­berry fields into seas,
The things I have seen have made me suf­fer (have pained my heart).
What is sur­pris­ing in this law of com­pen­sa­tions that re­quires abun­dance to man­i­fest some­where only as the coun­ter­part of a short­age that man­i­fests else­where?
The blue sky has con­tracted the habit of wag­ing with rosy cheeks the com­bat of jeal­ousy.”

Nguyễn, Du, Kim-Vân-Kiêu, trans. from Viet­namese by Nguyễn Văn Vénh, Hanoi: Édi­tions Alexan­dre-de-Rhodes, 1942-1943.

“From time im­memo­ri­al, among men,
Tal­ent and beau­ty—s­trange thing!—were en­e­mies.
I have trav­eled through life the space of a gen­er­a­tion,
And all that I have seen there has made me suf­fer in my heart!
By what strange mys­tery, miserly to­ward some, prodi­gal to­ward oth­ers,
Does heaven have the cus­tom of be­ing jeal­ous of beau­ti­ful girls?”

Nguyễn, Du, Kim Vân Kiều tân truyện (Kim Vân Kiều New Sto­ry), trans. from Viet­namese by Abel des Michels, Paris: E. Ler­oux, 1884-1885.

“A hun­dred years, the time of a hu­man life, bat­tle­field
Where, mer­ci­less­ly, des­tiny and tal­ent con­front each other
The ocean roars where mul­ber­ries once grew green
Of this world, the spec­ta­cle grips your heart
Why be sur­prised? Noth­ing is given with­out coun­ter­part
The blue sky of­ten per­se­cutes beau­ties with rosy cheeks”

Nguyễn, Du, Kiều: Les Amours mal­heureuses d’une je­une viet­nami­enne au 18e siè­cle (K­iều: The Un­for­tu­nate Love of a Young Viet­namese Woman in the 18th Cen­tu­ry), trans. from Viet­namese by Nguyễn Khắc Viện, Hanoi: Édi­tions en langues étrangères, 1965; reis­sued Paris; Mon­tre­al: L’Har­mat­tan, 1999.

“A hun­dred years—the max­i­mum of a hu­man ex­is­tence!—
Pass rarely with­out, with per­sis­tence
And as if fate en­vied their hap­pi­ness,
Mis­for­tune fall­ing upon tal­ented peo­ple.
Un­der­go­ing the harsh law of meta­mor­pho­sis,
One sees so many things born and die so quick­ly!
Very lit­tle time suf­fices for fa­tally
Strange changes to oc­cur here be­low,
For the sea to take the place of green mul­ber­ries
While, be­fore them, else­where, it fades away!
Now, in such a short time, what the ob­server
Can well see can only pain his heart:
How of­ten have I noted this so cruel law
Of com­pen­sa­tion, by virtue of which
Ev­ery be­ing, on one point, has great value
Only on con­di­tion of lack­ing it else­where!
In­eluctably, he must, through mis­for­tune,
Re­deem rare virtue or un­com­mon grace!
The blue sky, each day, ex­er­cises its wrath,
As if their bril­liance had made it jeal­ous
Upon the young beau­ties whose rosy face
By its charms seems to cast some shadow upon it!”

Nguyễn, Du, Kim-Van-K­iéou: Le Célèbre Poème an­na­mite (Kim-Van-K­iéou: The Fa­mous An­na­mite Po­em), trans. from Viet­namese by René Crayssac, Hanoi: Le-Van-Tan, 1926.

“A hun­dred years, bare­ly, limit our ex­is­tence, and yet, what bit­ter strug­gle be­tween our virtues and des­tiny! Time flees, mul­ber­ries cover the con­quered sea… But what spec­ta­cles to break our hearts! Strange law! Noth­ing to one, all to an­oth­er, and your ha­tred, blue sky, that pur­sues rosy cheeks!”

Nguyễn, Du, Kim Vân Kiều, trans. from Viet­namese by Mar­cel Robbe, Hanoi: Édi­tions Alexan­dre-de-Rhodes, 1944.

“A hun­dred years, in hu­man ex­is­tence,
How tal­ent and des­tiny hate each oth­er!
Through the al­ter­na­tion of seas and mul­berry fields,
The spec­ta­cle of the world wounds the heart!
Let one not be sur­prised at the law of com­pen­sa­tion
That the sky, jeal­ous of wom­en’s beau­ty, en­forces!”

Lê, Thành Khôi, His­toire et An­tholo­gie de la lit­téra­ture viet­nami­enne des orig­ines à nos jours (His­tory and An­thol­ogy of Viet­namese Lit­er­a­ture from Ori­gins to Our Days), Paris: Les In­des sa­van­tes, 2008.

“In the hun­dred years of a hu­man life,
How tal­ent and des­tiny vow ha­tred to each oth­er.
Through in­ces­sant up­heavals,
Events make me suf­fer painful­ly.
Usu­al­ly, as be­tween abun­dance and scarci­ty,
To rosy cheeks, the blue sky man­i­fests only jeal­ousy.”

Nguyễn, Du, Kim Vân Kiều en écri­t­ure nôm (Kim Vân Kiều in Nôm Scrip­t), trans. from Viet­namese by Đông Phong [N­guyễn Tấn Hưng] on Terre loin­taine, [on­line], ac­cessed Sep­tem­ber 4, 2025.

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