美国国家公共电台 NPR Cartoonist Thi Bui Weaves Together Personal And Political History

 

AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:

Cartoonist Thi Bui's graphic¹ memoir² is called "The Best We Could Do." It tells the story of her family in the years before, during and after the Vietnam War. It was nominated for an Eisner this year, mainstream³ comics' top award. NPR's Mallory Yu recently caught up with Bui at San Diego Comic-Con.

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THI BUI: In the reading I'm going to do for you right now, there are several voices. And I would like to not do them all.

MALLORY YU, BYLINE⁴: Standing⁵ at a podium in front of a few dozen people, Thi Bui begins her spotlight⁶ panel as one of Comic-Con's featured guests. She's the only one on stage. It's an intimate affair until she invites audience members to come up and read passages from her graphic novel.

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BUI: I'm going to try to entertain you a little bit before I make you sad.

YU: And her story is sad. Her parents lost nearly everything during the war and fled Vietnam in the late 1970s when Bui was just a small child.

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YU: Outside the San Diego Convention Center, people in cosplay rush to sign up for panels. There are men ringing bells on ice cream carts. And that's where I met up with Bui. She told me her research began with a grad school project.

BUI: I was in my late 20s. And I was a graduate student at NYU deconstructing all of the bad representations of Vietnamese people in the Vietnam War in movies and pop culture and American scholarship. So it was a very academic grumpiness that I had at the beginning.

YU: She wanted to do more with that research, to make it accessible to a wider audience. And she says graphic memoirs⁷ like Art Spiegelman's "Maus" about the Holocaust⁸ and Marjane Satrapi's "Persepolis" about the Islamic Revolution inspired her.

BUI: I really wanted to do what they did, you know - weave the personal and the political and historical to, you know, tell a story of the Vietnam War and all the things that caused it in a way that I felt like I hadn't seen before.

YU: So she interviewed the closest sources she had, her parents. Bui says telling them she was writing a book about their lives helped break the ice.

BUI: It's really hard to sit your parents down and say, tell me all your painful history. But if you tell them, I'm working on a book; could you help me with my school project, then, you know - then they - they'll oblige. You figure out your oblique⁹ Asian strategies (laughter).

YU: The book delves¹⁰ as much into her family's history as it does Vietnam's, traumatic things her parents had seen as children and young adults in the years before and during the war. And Bui says she asked basic questions to get the connective tissue of her parents' stories.

BUI: Was it hot? Were you hungry? How did the sand feel on your feet after you lost your slippers¹² in the boat?

YU: These questions helped her parents recall rich details that Bui wove into the graphic novel, details like the executions of political prisoners her father witnessed, how much money her mother got for selling her valuables, the dimensions of the boat her family took to flee Vietnam.

BUI: I'd heard a lot of the stories growing up. And the stories were pretty heavy, and I would often hear them at times when I wasn't ready. So I kind of had this sort of heaviness that I grew up with. And I wanted to make sense of the stories.

YU: She says she struggled with those stories of war and trauma¹¹ and hardship, that they cast a shadow over her life. Then she had a son, and that experience shifted the way she approached "The Best We Could Do."

BUI: I think that maybe if I had done it as not a parent, I might have been happy to just dwell in my trauma. But with a baby in hand, I was really concerned with not passing on that trauma myself. And so I needed to filter stuff out so that I could pass on something cleaner.

YU: And part of that healing came from examining her identity as a child of survivors¹³ and especially as a person who'd fled the place where she'd been born.

BUI: That identity is kind of like being the child of two divorced parents who won't talk to each other. I really yearn¹⁴ for reconciliation¹⁵ between people on both sides of that civil war. It's been my whole life. So understanding that your perspective is not the entire truth I think is an important stepping stone to getting there.

YU: For now, Thi Bui has reconciled her story with her parents'. And she hopes her book can provide a starting point for others to do the same. Mallory Yu, NPR News, San Diego.

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1 graphic   

adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的

参考例句：

• The book gave a graphic description of the war.这本书生动地描述了战争的情况。
• Distinguish important text items in lists with graphic icons.用图标来区分重要的文本项。

2 memoir   

n.[pl.]回忆录，自传；记事录

参考例句：

• He has just published a memoir in honour of his captain.他刚刚出了一本传记来纪念他的队长。
• In her memoir,the actress wrote about the bittersweet memories of her first love.在那个女演员的自传中，她写到了自己苦乐掺半的初恋。

3 mainstream   

n.（思想或行为的）主流；adj.主流的

参考例句：

• Their views lie outside the mainstream of current medical opinion.他们的观点不属于当今医学界观点的主流。
• Polls are still largely reflects the mainstream sentiment.民调还在很大程度上反映了社会主流情绪。

4 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

5 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

6 spotlight   

n.公众注意的中心，聚光灯，探照灯，视听，注意，醒目

参考例句：

• This week the spotlight is on the world of fashion.本周引人瞩目的是时装界。
• The spotlight followed her round the stage.聚光灯的光圈随着她在舞台上转。

7 memoirs   

n.回忆录；回忆录传( mem,自oir的名词复数)

参考例句：

• Her memoirs were ghostwritten. 她的回忆录是由别人代写的。
• I watched a trailer for the screenplay of his memoirs. 我看过以他的回忆录改编成电影的预告片。 来自《简明英汉词典》

8 holocaust   

n.大破坏；大屠杀

参考例句：

• The Auschwitz concentration camp always remind the world of the holocaust.奥辛威茨集中营总是让世人想起大屠杀。
• Ahmadinejad is denying the holocaust because he's as brutal as Hitler was.内贾德否认大屠杀，因为他像希特勒一样残忍。

9 oblique   

adj.斜的，倾斜的，无诚意的，不坦率的

参考例句：

• He made oblique references to her lack of experience.他拐弯抹角地说她缺乏经验。
• She gave an oblique look to one side.她向旁边斜看了一眼。

10 delves   

v.深入探究，钻研( delve的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• That delves the grave duly. 误不了你的洞房。 来自互联网
• The exhibition delves deep into the physics, aromatics and even the timbre of flatulence. 此次展览向人们介绍了人体物理、气味甚至肠胃胀气的声音等各方面知识。 来自互联网

11 trauma   

n.外伤，精神创伤

参考例句：

• Counselling is helping him work through this trauma.心理辅导正帮助他面对痛苦。
• The phobia may have its root in a childhood trauma.恐惧症可能源于童年时期的创伤。

12 slippers   

n. 拖鞋

参考例句：

• a pair of slippers 一双拖鞋
• He kicked his slippers off and dropped on to the bed. 他踢掉了拖鞋，倒在床上。

13 survivors   

幸存者，残存者，生还者( survivor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The survivors were adrift in a lifeboat for six days. 幸存者在救生艇上漂流了六天。
• survivors clinging to a raft 紧紧抓住救生筏的幸存者

14 yearn   

v.想念；怀念；渴望

参考例句：

• We yearn to surrender our entire being.我们渴望着放纵我们整个的生命。
• Many people living in big cities yearn for an idyllic country life.现在的很多都市人向往那种田园化的生活。

15 reconciliation   

n.和解，和谐，一致

参考例句：

• He was taken up with the reconciliation of husband and wife.他忙于做夫妻间的调解工作。
• Their handshake appeared to be a gesture of reconciliation.他们的握手似乎是和解的表示。