Tran Dan
Encyclopedia
Vietnam
Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...
ese poet
Poet
A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...
and novelist noted for his radical
Extremism
Extremism is any ideology or political act far outside the perceived political center of a society; or otherwise claimed to violate common moral standards...
works.
Dần was best known to be one of the active participators in the Nhân Văn affair
Nhân Van affair
The Nhân Văn affair was a political controversy in North Vietnam in the late 1950s. Following a loosening of political restrictions with some similarities to the Chinese Hundred Flowers Campaign, there was a hardening of attitudes...
in the mid 1950s which saw many middle class intellectuals demanding for freedom and democracy in communist-led North Vietnam
North Vietnam
The Democratic Republic of Vietnam , was a communist state that ruled the northern half of Vietnam from 1954 until 1976 following the Geneva Conference and laid claim to all of Vietnam from 1945 to 1954 during the First Indochina War, during which they controlled pockets of territory throughout...
. Born in Nam Định, he joined the Vietnamese Communist resistance against the French resistance in 1946 but by 1953 he had fallen out with the party. In 1956 he was jailed for months in Hoả Lò Prison also known as the Hanoi Hilton, where he tried to commit suicide
Suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
. On leaving prison he joined the Nhân Văn Giai Phẩm.
Until 1988, he was banned from having his works published although he continued to write novels and poems.
In 2007, he posthumously received the State Prize given by the government of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam . In February 2008, a collection of his poems, considered to be the most complete of his works, was allowed to be published in Vietnam, but shortly after publication the Ministry of Culture and Information fined the publisher 15 million VND for "violating administrative publishing policy" and stopped it from being distributed, but did not confiscate copies that have already been printed. News of the book banning caused concerns among many intellectuals in Vietnam; and 134 leading intellectuals specializing in literature had signed a petition requesting that the government reconsider its decision to ban the book.. The government responded by emphasizing that it did not fine the publisher for the contents of the book nor because of the author.