TRAN DANG KHOA’S POETRY AFTER 1975 – A CONTINUOUS STRETCH FROM “THE CORNER OF THE YARD” TO “THE SPACE OF THE SKY”

Abstract

Tran Dang Khoa is a phenomenon of Vietnam’s contemporary poetry. Before 1975, he was known as a child prodigy. After 1975, he became a soldier-poet. In Tran Dang Khoa’s poems, we can realize a romantic ego which makes a continuous stretch from “the corner of the yard” to “the space of sky”. It is the process, the inheritance and the devevelopment from a child ego to an adult ego but it is always consistent and continuous in typical characteristics: It is a simple, plain and profound ego that doesn’t repeat himself but doesn’t lose himself either. That ego has only one place to leave and to return – his homeland with his mother – where his childhood was protected and his dreams could fly to the high sky above. Going along with the time, seeing a lot of changes and displacement, that ego is still full of love and historical inspiration when he thinks of his country. All of the things create the attraction and the beauty of Tran Dang Khoa’s poetry in the time after 1975.