The Quiet American (Penguin, 1952), by Graham Greene, which was made into a Hollywood film starring Michael Caine in 2002, is a classic tale of espionage in the old colony. In fact, much of what is written -- or popular -- about Vietnam chronicles the country's recent strife, particularly the Vietnam War years. The list is long. Here are but a few:
In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam (Vintage, 1996), by former American Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara and Brian DeMark, is quite popular in Vietnam (a copy stands in a glass case at the War Museum in Ho Chi Minh City) as it tells the tale of American deceit and misinformation from the perspective of one of its more remorseful arbiters. A Bright Shining Lie (Vintage, 1989), by Neil Sheehan, is a similar explication. Pulitzer Prize-winning Fire in the Lake (Back Bay Books, 2002), by Francis Fitzgerald, is a sociological exploration of the war years and their aftermath.
Dispatches (Vintage International, 1991), by Michael Herr, is the seminal firsthand account of the war years. Other works like the Vietnamese classic The Sorrow of War (Riverhead Trace Reprint, 1996), by Bao Ninh, tell of personal experiences of soldiers and civilians caught in the fray. Ninh's book provides a unique perspective on the hardship faced by the North Vietnamese, often summarized as a highly motivated war machine and here portrayed as the conscripted cannon fodder that so many soldiers were. The Girl in the Picture: The Story of Kim Phuc and the Photograph That Changed the Course of the Vietnam War (Penguin, 2001), by Denise Chong, is self-explanatory.
Robert Olen Butler won a Pulitzer Prize for A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain (Grove Press, 2001), a collection of short stories recounting the legacy of war through disparate voices. Through Vietnam's Eyes is a selection of short stories published in the Vietnam News. Published locally, you can pick up a copy in bookstores in Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh.
Wandering Through Vietnamese Culture (The Gioi Publisher, 2004) is a collection of columns, arranged by subject, by Huu Ngoc, a unique insider's glimpse into the intricacies of this ancient culture.
Bikes of Burden (Visionary World, 2004) is a collection of photos by Hans Kemp chronicling the unlikely loads you see on Vietnam's motorcycles. See www.bikes-of-burden.com.
The Vietnam War was fertile terrain for Hollywood in the 1980s, and award-winning classics like Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now; The Deer Hunter, with Robert De Niro; Oliver Stone's Platoon; and later Born on the Fourth of July, a true story about returnee Ron Kovic. Films like Tran Anh Hung's The Scent of Green Papaya and Cyclo are more tranquil, studied views of Vietnamese culture. Indochine, starring Catherine Deneuve, is a historic portrait of the tumultuous end of colonialism in Vietnam. The Fog of War is a uniquely candid hindsight look by Robert S. McNamara, the Secretary of Defense during the war.
