Book Review: ‘The Sympathizer’ by Viet Thanh Nguyen
In light of the news that Mr. Ironman will be featuring in the TV Show adaptation of one of my favorite books, I would like to repost one of those few reviews I have ever written.
3 years ago before I moved for college, I started this book for, one, it won the Pulitzer Prize, and two, it was written by a Vietnamese American author, Viet Thanh Nguyen. I never got down to finish it until the pandemic hit. Welp, at least there is one silver lining to all this stay-at-home-unemployed-and-broke mess.
The book depicted the constant identity clash of the main character, the narrator of the story who is a half-Vietnamese, half-French undercover communist agent. The narrator remained his characteristic juxtapositions throughout the story. He was born and raised in Viet Nam then attended college in the U.S, so he is culturally a Vietnamese but intellectually a Westerner. He was a spy assigned by North Vietnam to be an official in the Southern government but eventually befriended with those supposedly his enemies.
The story took place after the fall of Sai Gon in 1975, when many Southern Vietnamese people came to the U.S as refugees. In such a complex setting of history, the book not only provided an interesting perspective about the war itself, but also contemplated the lives of Vietnamese refugees and their struggles in a novel land. It dealt with different levels of identity crisis, telling a story about a protagonist whose acrobatic ability to balance his multiple identities and about his surrounding people’s internal grapples as well.
Such an overwhelmingly powerful story delivered with a virtuosic command of language! Being a Vietnamese who just completed an advanced History course on The Vietnam War in the US, i could not have appreciated this book more fully. I could see the war through a new lense, through the eye of the silenced Saigon refugees, so novel but pertinent.
But the book concerns much more than the war itself. Indeed, it took me on an exhilarating roller coaster ride of intense emotions. The story is rich in suspense, unpredictable with fascinating turns of events, and insightful in psychological growth. Though I must admit I do not fathom some characters’ actions toward the end.
Be warned this is not a pleasant read. That is why it is not available in Vietnamese. It’s also a difficult linguistically. But it’s worth every moment of discomfort you might feel.
