Book Club Series: Interview with Viet Thanh Nguyen

The Dear Asian Youth book club recently had the pleasure of interviewing Viet Thanh Nguyen (Nguyễn Thanh Việt),  an accomplished Vietnamese-American author, professor, and novelist. He is known for his works The Sympathizer and The Commited, a ground-breaking spy thriller series that explores the moral conflicts faced by a half-French, half-Vietnamese Communist spy as he navigates the Vietnam War. His debut book, The Sympathizer, was a New York Times best seller and winner of the 2016 Pulitzer prize for fiction, making it on over 30 “book-of-the-year” lists.

Outside of writing and teaching, Nguyen also dedicates his time to spotlighting the world of Vietnamese art and culture as a co-director for the Diasporic Vietnamese Artists Network where he organizes youth art groups and festivals that brings light to Vietnamese voices in the diaspora. He is also the publisher for diaCRITICS, a blog that features reviews, interviews, and much more that centers around Vietnamese art and film production.

As a Vietnamese immigrant to the United States, he has become known for his ability to tell stories that center around the immigrant experience. He humanizes the immigrant struggle and feelings of alienation many refugees experience through being uprooted from their previous lives. In the interview, he talks about the impact of growing up as an immigrant and refugee, and how those experiences shaped his career, his writing, and his worldviews.

Editors: Chris Fong Chew, Lang Duong