Bao Ninh’s The Sorrow of War connects the tragedy of wartime to the loss of youth and love. It is the story of an idealist named Kien and his first love, Phuong, and how the dramatic events of war caused their pure love to diminish little by...

The Sorrow of War is a unique war novel in that it places special attention on the different parts of the lives of its characters: before the war, and after. The main character, Kien, takes up most of the book with his life stories. However, there...

In 1991, Bao Ninh published his novel with the title Thân Phận Của Tình Yêu, or The Destiny of Love in accordance with North Vietnamese regulations to publish material that only glorified the war, reflecting Ho Chi Minh's fervent patriotism to...

Francis Ford Coppola’s 1979 Vietnam War film Apocalypse Now, a loose adaptation of Joseph Conrad’s novel Heart of Darkness, shows American MACV-SOG Captain Benjamin Willard’s journey in terminating rogue U.S. colonel Walter Kurtz. Bao Ninh’s 1993...