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A review by hereisenough
The Refugees by Viet Thanh Nguyen
4.0
Nguyen writes short stories concerning Vietnamese refugees of varying ages and situations. Stories include a ghost writer visited by her dead brother, a young refugee staying with a gay couple, and a woman returning to Vietnam to visit family.
While these stories didn’t necessarily bring me to tears or change my life, they’re so beautifully written, both heartbreaking and beautiful. Each was interesting, unique, and believable, bringing an issue (such as refugees and immigration) into a very human light, allowing the “issue” to become a face. Impactful.
Simple humanity is a major theme, allowing refugees to be actual people. There are also themes of awakening sexuality, safety, acceptance of the past, and family ties.
The Color Purple reflects characters having to redefine themselves post-trauma. The Grapes of Wrath reflects the struggle of the American dream and migration. Farewell to Manzanar concerns war, racism, and refugees within their own home. “The Jungle” by Upton Sinclair raised awareness for immigrants and their conditions and rights.
In Doree Shafrir’s Buzzfeed article ‘Viet Thanh Nguyen's "The Refugees" Is The Book We Need Now’ he says, “That idea of the immigrant as being part of an American story is so fundamentally strong that I was automatically being put into that story by reviewers and critics and so on. I had to actively say, ‘No, it’s not accurate.’ We need to understand how refugees are different so that we don’t erase the specificity of their experience.”
While these stories didn’t necessarily bring me to tears or change my life, they’re so beautifully written, both heartbreaking and beautiful. Each was interesting, unique, and believable, bringing an issue (such as refugees and immigration) into a very human light, allowing the “issue” to become a face. Impactful.
Simple humanity is a major theme, allowing refugees to be actual people. There are also themes of awakening sexuality, safety, acceptance of the past, and family ties.
The Color Purple reflects characters having to redefine themselves post-trauma. The Grapes of Wrath reflects the struggle of the American dream and migration. Farewell to Manzanar concerns war, racism, and refugees within their own home. “The Jungle” by Upton Sinclair raised awareness for immigrants and their conditions and rights.
In Doree Shafrir’s Buzzfeed article ‘Viet Thanh Nguyen's "The Refugees" Is The Book We Need Now’ he says, “That idea of the immigrant as being part of an American story is so fundamentally strong that I was automatically being put into that story by reviewers and critics and so on. I had to actively say, ‘No, it’s not accurate.’ We need to understand how refugees are different so that we don’t erase the specificity of their experience.”