A Vietnamese American writer on war, capitalism and Trump
Viet Thanh Nguyen, a Pulitzer Prize winner, tries to untangle the complicated relationship between Vietnam and America and reconcile the opposing narratives that shaped his life
A child of the Vietnam war who arrived in the US when he was four, Nguyen is at once outsider and citizen, provocative terrain for a writer seeking to articulate and reconcile the opposing national narratives that have shaped his life. His first novel, The Sympathizer, which won a Pulitzer Prize this year, is set against American involvement in Vietnam, as told by a sly protagonist of multiple perspectives: “a spy, a sleeper, a spook, a man of two faces”.
The book is gleaming and uproarious, a dark comedy of confession filled with charlatans, delusionists and shameless opportunists. It is the unabashed companion to Nguyen’s Nothing Ever Dies, a sobering non-fiction meditation on war, inhumanity and remembrance that is a finalist for the National Book Awards, which will be announced on Wednesday.
Such recognition has marked a busy time for Nguyen, who the other day sat at his dining room table in Los Angeles, laptop open, and typed a few thoughts, more in demand these days than before he won the Pulitzer. Donald Trump was discussed. Or, as Nguyen noted, the man who aroused “white nativist feelings directed against immigrants and minorities”.
Vietnamese-born academic’s debut novel wins Pulitzer Prize for Fiction
Trump is the fusion of populist politics and the cult of personality; a reality TV star and one-percenter who, as Nguyen sees it, is part of a virtual economy based partly on celebrity that benefits the rich but creates no jobs.