Mr. Vu Xuan Tuc : Learn Literature to conceive life

Vietnamese version by Le Duc Phuong, H1 00-03

I met Mr. Vu again o­n Teachers’ day, 11/20/2003. The antique living room door friendly invited me inside, like it had greeted hundreds of my teacher’s students.
My old teacher,sitting in his chair, greeted me with his warm smile and a shaky handshake. He seemed to be recovering, but I could see clearly behind that smile the endurance of his recent stroke.

I felt a little bit awkward , as this was the first time we talked about things other than Literature.

Q: How’s your recovery? Are you getting better now?
A: Today is 5 months even from the day I was hospitalized in the Emergency. I’m recovering , however. Now, I have to follow a special diet and try to walk everyday. I hope I will be able to come back to school this week to see my students and colleagues. I haven’t been back to school since that day.

I was glad to see him still sensible, and that the gruesome disease hasn’t been successful in driving his spirit down

Q: When did you start your teaching career?
A: I started in 1965. Thirty nine years of my teaching career now…. I first taught in Tien Du School, then enrolled in the army for 7 years, then backed to Hanoi to teach again in Hoang Van Thu and Viet Duc schools before ended up at Hanoi-Amsterdam.

Q: When and why did you choose Hanoi-Amsterdam finally?
A: Previously, I taught the first Literature-gifted class in Viet Duc School. After the Board of Education put all the gifted-classes at Hanoi-Amsterdam in 1985, I decided to move to our school.

Q: You must have been very good at Literature in high school. But what had strongly led you to this teaching career in Literature?
A: All my high school peers said so, but I didn’t think I was really that good, just knew for sure that I liked it a lot, partly because of my father’s influence. He loved to read and write literary works. That’s why I choose this career, though I had preferred Architecture to Teaching. However, years of teaching have helped me love and appreciate the meaningfulness of my profession more.

Q: Among all the classes you have taught, which o­ne impresses you the most?
A: I have a lot of good students from each class, like classes of ’85, ’97, and ’00. However, my best student is Pham Hai Anh, member of the first literature-gifted class at Ams (’85). She had won the national prize in Literature, then went directly to Teachers’ College, and started teaching after that. She has successfully completed her PhD. Now Hai Anh is in Holland, famous in and out of Vietnam for her writings.

Q: How do you feel now when you can no longer teach?
A: Life always has its ups and downs. My biggest down is that I’m old, and can no longer help you students. It’s not just the sadness of a retired teacher, but of a retired teacher in not so good heath.

Q: What do you expect the Board of Education and future student generations to accomplish?
A: For the first, I hope it will produce such policies that will be satisfactory so that the next student generation can achieve a lot more than their predecessors. For the latter, I hope they all will figure out the paths for their future. Each should have his or her own way that will be beneficial to the society. Teachers should not force their students to go this or that way, but help the students realize their true ability.

Q: Some people believe Literature as it is taught in high school now is far off reality, because although the works being introduced are masterpieces, they all picture the past, the war, but not the contemporary. This may bore students, don’t you think?
A: It’s neither the student nor the works to blame. It’s the teacher. It’s unavoidable to introduce such works into today’s lectures. The crux of the matter is that teachers should help bring knowledge of the past to contemporary readers, discover today’s trends and try to use past works to explain them. Literary works of the past have the present’s reflection, even those about war. In wartime, people put their personal desires away to commit to the common cause, now, people in the name of their personal desires are trying to forget about the commons’. Thus, literary works of the past help adjust the relations between human-beings.

Q: Can you give us some pieces of advice o­n how to learn Literature efficiently?
A: There’re lots of methods, but I think first, you should read a lot, not o­nly those literary works but also references from newspapers, etc… then, you should also do a lot of writing, again, not just literary writings, but journal, or even letter writing would also help, too. When writing, you should practice using appropriate grammar and word choice. The most important goal of learning Literature is to conceive life. In turn, the better you conceive life, the more you will make out of Literature.

Q: You must have written a lot. Can you tell us about some of your writings?
A: In general, not o­nly should teachers but also students be encouraged to write. First is to satisfy our own desires, and second is to understand more about the writers' world, thus, have some insights to their works we have studied. As of my writings, my favourite o­nes are the book “A memorable trip” and the poem “Drumming sound at commencement”

Q: Could you tell us more about your “memorable trip”?
A: It’s my trip to some European countries, such as France, Belgium, Holland, and Germany. I especially like Paris and Rome. But what I have reaped from this trip is not o­nly the exotic European cultures, but also poignant understanding of the meaningfulness of the teaching profession. From Noi Bai Airport to the almost anywhere I went in Europe, I got to meet my old students again. They had welcomed me with their whole heart. I have realized that if we teachers are sincere,and strict in a constructive way to our students, they will appreciate it all.

Q: How’s your family life?
A: I’m very happy as my wife is also my colleague, and we had taught at other schools together before Ams, too. My kids had grown up, so I don’t really have anything to worry about. We should be satisfied with what we have. The happiest thing is that my students and my own children have actively received what I had passed o­n to them.

Q: Do you have any wishes now?
A: I just wish that I would soon recover and somehow would be able to do something for my students. I miss them, … whoever in my situation can understand my feeling.

Q: Do you know about HAO- Hanoi-Amsterdam Students Organization?
A: Oh, this is the first time I knew about HAO. I’m glad that today’s student generation can do things that were unimaginable in the past. This is such a good achievement. I suggest that HAO have some introduction about Hanoi-Amsterdam notable accomplishments, memories about Hanoi-Amsterdam with teachers and peers, and forums where students can discuss today’s issues. I wish you great success.

We also wish you and your family health and happiness.

Translated by Nguyen Quynh My
Submitted by Tran Bich Thuy A2-03-06