At the age of twenty-four, Dang Thuy Tram volunteered to serve as a doctor in a National Liberation Front (Viet Cong) battlefield hospital in the Q...
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Feb 25, 2011
Bennet
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This book broke my heart. It's not the first account I've read of a young woman in war, or in this war, but it's the first diary, and just the idea of keeping a diary in the middle of a war gets to me.
Keeping a diary in a war strikes me as the most personal, conscientious and humanizing of gestures, made under the most inhumane circumstances. Just the determination required to maintain the practice with any consistency impresses me, and in all that rain!
It rained and ra More...
Keeping a diary in a war strikes me as the most personal, conscientious and humanizing of gestures, made under the most inhumane circumstances. Just the determination required to maintain the practice with any consistency impresses me, and in all that rain!
It rained and ra More...
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Sep 29, 2009
Membaca diary seseorang sepertinya serasa membuka kotak pandora. Ruang privat yang teramat dalam, namun kini terbuka. Ketika itu terjadi dari sosok pribadi yang hidup di negara dengan filosofi politik yang didomonasi oleh kuatnya nilai komunal, tak pelak perlu kecurigaan. Apakah ini semacam propaganda? Sejauh mana pribadi itu bersuara? Apakah diari itu semacam escaping room bagi penulisnya dikarenakan tulisannya dipenuhi hal-hal yang tabu atau mengundang antipati publik?
Lagipun ada j More...
Lagipun ada j More...
Jul 25, 2011
Carol
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This was a VERY powerful read. It is one of three diaries documented by a young female North Vietnam physician during the Vietnam War (the other 2 diaries were lost). Reminded me very much of Anne Frank, the difference being a diary of a teenager compared to that of a young woman. Having grown up with the Vietnam War in my background as Dads were stationed there I learned more about the countries of North and South Vietnam, their history, and how the US became engaged in the conflict in more
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Nov 28, 2010
Rebecca
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Dang Thuy Tram’s diaries were a difficult read for me, only partly because of the pain and hardship of war that she describes. Many of the insights and emotions she expresses are universal to any military doctor in any war faced with death on a daily basis for weeks, months, years on end, and my heart broke for Thuy as she pours out her love for her injured and dying brothers, as she longs for the home and family she left behind, and as she deals with separation from the man who held her heart.
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Apr 23, 2009
William
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The whole story of how this diary came to publication is very interesting and reading the diary is an experience I highly recommend.
Since it wasn't written with the intention of publication it can be choppy and repetitious at times as Thuy worked through her feelings towards war, love, family and her ethical code. Yet her constant self-examination and her evaluation of character traits in others cast light on the soul of someone who was very introspective and the philosophical closings o More...
Since it wasn't written with the intention of publication it can be choppy and repetitious at times as Thuy worked through her feelings towards war, love, family and her ethical code. Yet her constant self-examination and her evaluation of character traits in others cast light on the soul of someone who was very introspective and the philosophical closings o More...
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Jun 23, 2011
It was an overall of book. It was a little slow because the same thing happened over and over. It was a journal so that is what made it slow. I would only recommend this book to people who like to read biographies and journal type books. This book is related to the time era and my propaganda poster because it is about the Vietnam War. The book is a journal of a doctor that patches up wounded South Vietnamese soldiers and American Soldiers. My propaganda is related to my book because the book is
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Sep 16, 2009
Terry
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This 'little' book impacted me....and potentially a few other people in this world....like no other. This is the diary of a young, idealistic doctor who worked, not near, but in the precise location where I was in Viet Nam....at precisely the same time I was in Viet Nam....when she talks about the 'devil Americans'....that's ME! As I read the diary entries I realized, the day I arrived in Viet Nam was nearing....then I arrived....then I traveled to the small LZ north of Quang Ngai....then she
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Jan 22, 2009
Tim
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I only rated this 3 stars - probably because it was, after all, two full years worth of diary entries. After the first 150 entries, one is reminded that this is a diary ...
However, the larger story is very provocative and the context becomes 5 star material. A young woman doctor from the North travels to the South to be a part of the medical teams in the war zone supporting the Viet Cong - our term - fellow Vietnamese, her term. She loves her country, both north and south, and wa More...
However, the larger story is very provocative and the context becomes 5 star material. A young woman doctor from the North travels to the South to be a part of the medical teams in the war zone supporting the Viet Cong - our term - fellow Vietnamese, her term. She loves her country, both north and south, and wa More...
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Dec 30, 2009
Phuong
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It’s difficult to contain emotions-mine through hers. The diary hits me personally. I was born to the lullaby of this war. I grew up witnessing its savagery engulfing lives & humanity… Indeed, the diary has the fire within. Her words are raw & achingly vivid as she accounts amid the atrocities, annihilation & dehumanization of war the very core of human conditions, existence & veracity. Fate did deny her life. But chances & choices, death can’t deny her. Her voice echoes eternally. She is extrao
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Dec 29, 2009
Phuong
rated it:
It's difficult to contain emotions-mine through hers. The diary hits me personally. I was born to the lullaby of this war. I grew up witnessing its savagery engulfing lives & humanity... Indeed, the diary has the fire within. Her words are raw & achingly vivid as she accounts amid the atrocities, annihilation & dehumanization of war the very core of human conditions, existence & veracity. Fate did deny her life. But chances & choices, death can't deny her. Her voice echoes eternally. She
More...
Jan 11, 2012
Steve
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I read this book before visiting Vietnam back in early 2008. I am glad I did. It completely humanised the Vietnam War for me. Anyone who wants to think that war is heroic and noble and all that BS should read books about war (by participants)and truely get an eye-witness account. I have read other books about war and I can honestly say this one touched me a great deal. My only regret about visiting Vietnam (apart from getting my electric shaver nicked from my suitcase by baggage handlers at Ha
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Aug 12, 2011
Larry
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The excellent fifteen page introduction by Frances Fitzgerald of Last Night I Dreamed of Peace contains some incisive observations about the book, its meaning and its history and its origins. The book itself is a diary, an interior monologue by the main character Dang Thuy Tram, a mid twenty-something woman who is a new doctor in the midst of the war in Vietnam. Her job is to care for wounded Viet Cong soldiers just below the seventeenth parallel that divides the North and the South. She is surr
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Oct 23, 2008
Kim
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the last entry in her diary seemed particularly poignant. her last words tot he world... and she didn't know it. I kept thinking about her mother, and how she felt reading the diary years after Dang's death. Dang would read their letters and write responses to people in her diary, things she didn't tell them in her letters. such love she had. If she didn't like anyone, she wouldn't name them, but spoke about their actions. and those she loved, she always carried in her thoughts. such a loving ca
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Jul 31, 2008
Charles
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It seems that the more we understand our enemy, the more we see them functioning in their daily lives, the harder it is to kill them. Perhaps that is why we dehumanize them; how sad. Ms. Tram’s diary of living under a jungle canopy in the middle of a battle field is almost as eye opening for the Vietnam War, as “All Quite on The Western Front,” was for WWI and “The Diary of Ann Franks” during WWII. A young lady, a doctor gladly volunteering to serve her country to care for her wounded country
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May 28, 2009
Angela
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What I've noticed about most of the reviews of this book... is that they all mention the story of how the diary came to be published. They call that story interesting, intriguing, fascinating. And then there's the diary, where I see the words repetetive and never meant for publication mentioned a lot.
Basically, people don't want to give this a bad review because it is what it is. The story of a girl who died in the medical service of her country during the Vietnam War.
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Basically, people don't want to give this a bad review because it is what it is. The story of a girl who died in the medical service of her country during the Vietnam War.
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Mar 30, 2008
Rachel
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The found diary of a young Vietnamese woman this book seems to lie on the cusp between memoir and autobiography (if there is such a place). Written during the Vietnam war and later rescued from a pile of documents to be burned, it tells of haunting moments throughout the conflict with the US, the pain of loss, and the tender memories of family and love. The prose alternates between the romanticism that only a young revolutionary could convey and more straightforward explanations of the enemy enc
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Mar 24, 2011
Amanda
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This is the remnants of Thuy's diary from the war. She was an incredible young woman who embodies the struggle of idealism in the midst of adversity. This book has profoundly impacted me. Ironically she wrote it the same time that my father was fighting in Viet Nam. I related to many of the struggles she chronicles in her diary and I wonder that this young woman and I could share so many thoughts when my father was her enemy. Definitely read! It's beautiful and poetic and lamentably tragic.
Dec 08, 2010
Natchanon
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This book is a diary of Dang Thuy Tram, which was found by an American officer in 1970. Dang Thuy Tram was a doctor in a National Liberty Front battlefield hospital in Quang Ngai Province. she was killed by american forces in the Vietnam War. The diary talks about her friends and family, the Vietnam War, her love in highschool, and proving her loyalty to her own country. Last year I learned about Vietnam war but not learning about the important person during the war. I really enjoyed reading thi
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Dec 19, 2008
I had high hopes for this book because I don't see a whole lot of novels or memoirs written by Vietnamese authors about the Vietnam War and this was one of the few I found. It is a very slow read for me. I'm having a hard time with the poetic nature of the book. Additionally, I find little substance regarding the war and the history of the war. The monotonous overtone of this person's reflection about herself and the men that she nurtured is a bit boring. I'm half way through the book and I
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Mar 27, 2011
Sally
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This real life diary of a North Viet female medic is an intimate view into the psyche of a devoted party member who sacrifices herself to serve in the war, all the while struggling with real life issues of love, jealousy, deep homesickness. I was deeply affected by her animosity for the American "devils" who were ravaging her land. The sotry of how her diary gets published is fascinating too.
Oct 28, 2008
Laurie
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This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers.
To view it, click here
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Dec 29, 2007
Betsy
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The story of how this diary came to light is interesting - an American soldier who was supposed to destroy all non-military related materials didn't end up burning it because his Vietnamese translator said there is already fire in this book, don't destroy it! Thuy was a remarkable young woman - a doctor who was passionate and intelligent and who shares her personal sorrows and triumphs with us thereby offering a perspective on the Vietnam War that we, as Americans, don't often, if ever see. In s
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Jan 29, 2008
John
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A woman of some privilege, at the age of 24 Dang Thuy Tram volunteered to serve as a doctor for the Viet Cong. Embracing the propaganda of her country completely, she headed off to South Vietnam and a war from which she will never return. Parts of this book were difficult to read as they reflect her astonishing naiveté about life, love, people, the government and the deaths of those around her who are killed in the war. Understandably, she has a deep hatred of the Americans and rejoices when the
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Dec 27, 2010
Don
rated it:
Insight into the life and thoughts of a Viet Cong doctor supporting the war in South Vietnam in the late 1960's. A sad look into the mind of a smart, young communist ideologue and very likely an accurate look into the minds of her sisters in brothers in North Korea today. A reminder that a bullet kills old enemies and makes new enemies.
Sep 15, 2010
Jen
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This is the kind of book that I would have eaten up during a phase in my younger life when I was fascinated by the Vietnam War. As an adult, I found it sweet and poignant, but ultimately it was just reading someone's diary, which isn't really edge-of-your-seat reading (plus you know there will be no climax and resolution!).
I didn't finish it, but if you would like a front-row seat to war through the eyes of a North Vietnamese field doctor, you might like to try this. Apparently it i More...
I didn't finish it, but if you would like a front-row seat to war through the eyes of a North Vietnamese field doctor, you might like to try this. Apparently it i More...
Jul 11, 2010
Valarie
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It was very interesting to read about someone on the "other side" of the Vietnam war, and parts of the diary were very poignant. The footnotes provided a lot of educational information as well. Of course, since Thuy Tram didn't intend to write a memoir but was simply writing about her days, there is no story arc and most plots are left unfinished.
Dec 22, 2010
Steve
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Poignant for anyone who lived through this fiasco. I gained an appreciation of the qualities which they possessed and we lacked.... as well as a poignant glimpse of my enemy's humanity. A primary source document.
Jul 03, 2010
This book was such an interesting take on the Vietnam war. I realized how little I really knew about the time period and it made me want to read more. It also really challenged my dominant cultural narrative which is absolutely invaluable. I felt really connected with Thuy.
Jan 23, 2008
Brigette
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A diary during war by a young idealist. While it is monotonous at times, it is also very affecting. Thuy was a young doctor from Hanoi who served the NVA and the Party by working in underground clinics in the South, tending to wounded NVA and Vietcong, all the while being subject to surprise raids and bombing attacks by the U.S. and ARVN forces. Her humility and her deep compassion for her comrades are very touching. It's not a spoiler to say that she dies, as that is made clear in the intro to
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Aug 09, 2011
a strong voice in the midst of confusion... reminding us how we are all-- north and south, east and west-- human.
