Prof. Nguyen The Anh

From: Lan PHAMNGOC <lan_phamngoc@yahoo.com>
Sent: Friday, March 24, 2023 1:47 AM
To: thompson.michele@sbcglobal.net; francois.guillemot@ens-lyon.fr; Hue-Tam Tai <huetamtai@gmail.com>; mpaqtoan2@gmail.com
Cc: vsg@u.washington.edu
Subject: Re: [Vsg] Prof. Nguyen The Anh passed away (1936-2023)

It is with particular sadness that I learnt the news of Prof. Nguyen The Anh's passing away. I had the privilege to be his student at EPHE (Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris) in 1993-94.

Quand je préparais mon DEA en Histoire à l'Université Paris 7 (Denis Diderot) en 1993-94, je suivais un cours du Professeur Nguyễn Thế Anh à l'EPHE, à l'époque situé à la Sorbonne. Après l'obtention de mon DEA, je préparais une thèse sur l'histoire contemporaine du Viêt Nam avec M. Daniel Hémery, thèse interrompue après deux années de travail, due à notre émigration (mon épouse et moi) aux Etats-Unis. Au bout de neuf ans, nous sommes revenus en France, et en nous installant en région toulousaine, nous avons eu l'agréable surprise de retrouver M. Nguyễn Thế Anh qui était à la retraite et habitait la même région.

Chúng tôi được hân hạnh gặp lại Giáo Sư Nguyễn Thế Anh nhiều lần tại tư gia của ông ở một ngoại ô phía bắc của Toulouse. Trong khung cảnh đó, GS tỏ ra là một người vui tính, dù vẫn giữ vẻ đạo mạo của một vị đã từng là Viện trưởng Việt Đại Học Huế. Lần nào đến, chúng tôi cũng được GS tặng sách mới xuất bản của ông hoặc những sách chúng tôi chưa có.

Có lần đến thăm, GS đưa hai vợ chồng vào phòng giới thiệu phu nhân (người ngoại quốc), bị bịnh kinh niên. Lần cuối cùng chúng tôi đến thăm GS và tặng cuốn sách "De Père Inconnu" của tôi năm 2015 thì phu nhân đã qua đời, có con gái của GS đến đấy giúp đỡ.

Xin thắp một nén hương tưởng nhớ người Thầy khả kính.
Phạm Ngọc Lân

From: Chau NGUYEN NGOC <yakiribocou@gmail.com>
Sent: Tuesday, March 21, 2023 5:18 PM
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: [Vsg] Prof. Nguyen The Anh passed away (1936-2023)

Dear all,

After Pierre Brocheux, now is Professor Nguyễn Thế Anh who leaves us. This is very sad news.

Professor Nguyễn Thế Anh greatly helped me with valuable advice in the writing of my second book “Viet Nam- Political history of the two wars- Independence war (1858-1954) and Ideological war (1945-1975)”.

Hereafter is the translation of the “Letter from the Author” of the 3rd edition of the French version published in March this year 2023.

Letter from the author

Two books in Vietnamese about my family published in Việt Nam (1) pushed me to write one in French (2) in 2018, at the request of my wife and children. In writing it, I discovered, like many, that what I know about the history of this country is only a fraction of reality. The research I conducted to find answers to the questions I asked myself finally led to the writing of this second book in French.

Professor Nguyễn Thế Anh (3) greatly helped me in my endeavour with valuable advice. The historian Pierre Brocheux, who wrote the Preface to the book on my family, also did so for this book on the two wars. Professor Janet Alison Hoskins (USC, Los Angeles, USA) is the author of the foreword to the English version published in the United States in 2021. I owe them my deepest gratitude and therefore express my warmest thanks to them. I also thank the authors of the many works that constitute, with the many archives consulted, the essential sources of the information that I transmit through this book.

I dedicate this one to all those who are interested in Việt Nam, and especially to those who have Vietnamese blood in their veins. That knowledge of the past of their homeland – or the homeland of their ancestors – allows them to understand that the present and future of a country are not built without pain and tears.

Nguyễn Ngọc Châu

Paris, 1 April 2022

(1) 1) Đêm Trắng của Đức Giáo Tông (The sleepless nights of the Virtuous Giáo Tông (Superior Grand Master [of Caodaism]), Trầm Hương, nxb Công An Nhân Dân, TPHCM,2001 ; 2) Dũng khí (the hero) Nguyễn Ngọc Nhựt, Nguyễn Hùng, Hội nhà văn, nxb Trẻ, TP Hồ Chí Minh, 2001.

(2) Le Temps des ancêtres, une famille vietnamienne dans sa traversée du XXe siècle, prefaced by Historian Pierre Brocheux, éditions L'Harmattan, Paris, 2018.

(3) Former “rector” of the University of Hue, professor at the University of Saigon, director of the Centre d’Histoire et Civilisations de la Péninsule Indochinoise (EPHE-/CNRS), director of studies emeritus at the École Pratique des Hautes Études (Historical and Philological Sciences), Professor Nguyên Thế Anh has written 20 works, more than 150 articles and numerous research reports on Vietnam published in Europe, in the United States, China, Japan and Southeast Asia (see http://www.viethoc.com/Ban-Ging-Hun/nguyen-the-anh).

Nguyễn Ngọc Châu (author of two books on Viet Nam)

From: Gábor Vargyas <mpaqtoan2@gmail.com>
Sent: Monday, March 20, 2023 3:18 PM
To: Guillemot Francois <francois.guillemot@ens-lyon.fr>
Cc: VSG <Vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: [Vsg] Prof. Nguyen The Anh passed away (1936-2023)

Dear All,

it is with particular sadness that I learnt the news of Prof. Nguyen The Anh's passing away.

We met first in 1998 at the International Convention of Asia Scholars in Nordwijkerhout, Holland. I lectured on dry and wet rice cultivation among the Bru of Quang Tri, and in his comment to my paper he confirmed what I was hesitating to believe that Vietnamese people held upland dry rice in greater esteem than their own. We had a short but very memorable chat after that: he was kind, modest, supportive.

The following year I spent 6 months in Paris with a scholarship finishing the manuscript of my book "A la recherche des Brou perdus" (that came out in 2000). As it was about Bru ethnohistory, I had to venture partially to a territory absolutely unknown to me: Vietnamese history and, especially, historical documents, annals etc. He gave me inestimable help in guiding me in all these matters. We met several times discussing problems, answering my questions, teaching Vietnamese history, or simply chatting.

Most generously, at the end he offered me to correct my French. When I got back the manuscript, my jaw fell: 4-8 grammatical mistakes at each page! (French is not an easy language, especially not in written form.) Groping for words I tried to thank him. He smiled gently and said: "It is difficult for a foreigner, you know; I finished secondary school in Saigon in one of the best colleges"... Now wonder, his name is acknowledged twice in my Preface (p. 11) and even now, when I think of him, I feel the emotion overcoming me. I have lost in him a much esteemed colleague, a dear elder. I feel sorry that my path of life has taken me far from him and that our correspondence became sporadic lately.

My sincere condolences to his family, R.I.P.

Gábor Vargyas, Budapest

From: Hue-Tam Tai <huetamtai@gmail.com>
Sent: Monday, March 20, 2023 12:56 PM
To: thompson.michele@sbcglobal.net; francois.guillemot@ens-lyon.fr
Cc: Vsg@u.washington.edu
Subject: Re: [Vsg] Prof. Nguyen The Anh passed away (1936-2023)

Each of us is personally indebted to Prof. Nguyen The Anh for his meticulous scholarship and generous guidance. th I also want to register his kindness and sense of humor. I had known him only through his writings when I bumped into him in the archives at Aix. I had no plan other than go the archives every day, then return to my hotel.
Nguyen The Anh took me under his wing and brought me to a local friend of his. We spent a delightful evening with good food (not .pho again, exclaimed our host's wife) and much laughter. I saw a totally different side of Nguyen The Anh from the sober and serious scholar I had imagined.
We kept in sporadic touch, but this image of him, relaxed and laughing, is the one I want to remember him by.

Hue-Tam Ho Tai
Harvard University emerita

From: Guillemot Francois <francois.guillemot@ens-lyon.fr>
Sent: Monday, March 20, 2023 12:55 PM
To: michele thompson <thompson.michele@sbcglobal.net>
Cc: VietnamStudies Group <Vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: [Vsg] Prof. Nguyen The Anh passed away (1936-2023)

Dear Michele, dear all,

Thank you Michele for your personal testimony. We have published online today on my academic blog some tributes to Professor Nguyen The Anh. In a few days, more tributes will be published, I hope so.

https://indomemoires.hypotheses.org/

All the best

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15 parvis René Descartes
BP 7000, 69342 Lyon cedex 07
www.ens-lyon.fr

Guillemot François
Historien, ingénieur de recherche CNRS

Institut d'Asie Orientale - UMR 5062

Tél. 04 37 37 62 41
francois.guillemot@ens-lyon.fr
Responsable des collections vietnamiennes
Référent ingénierie de projets
Membre du Bureau éditorial d'ENS éditions
----------------------------
Carnets de recherche & ressources
https://guerillera.hypotheses.org/
https://indomemoires.hypotheses.org/
https://indosources.hypotheses.org/
https://virtual-saigon.net/

From: michele thompson <thompson.michele@sbcglobal.net>
Sent: Monday, March 20, 2023 11:36 AM
To: Guillemot Francois <francois.guillemot@ens-lyon.fr>
Cc: VietnamStudies Group <Vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: [Vsg] Prof. Nguyen The Anh passed away (1936-2023)

Dear All,

It was with great sadness that I read this news yesterday morning while waiting to go into a panel at this year’s AAS in Boston. Everyone I saw from the Vietnamese Studies contingent for the next couple of hours before I left to return home was discussing the late great GS Nguyen The Anh and his many contributions to Vietnamese Studies. This is a sad loss for the field and it is also a sad loss for many of us personally.

I first met GS Nguyen The Anh in 1997 and although we did not see each other more than once every 2-3 years after that we carried on a lively email correspondence. Nguyen The Anh was unfailingly kind and encouraging to me and he helped me in ways too numerous to count. I will truly miss his sharp insights and gentle support.

My sincere condolences to his family, his students, and his many colleagues.

regards

Michele

michele thompson

thompson.michele@sbcglobal.net

From: Guillemot Francois <francois.guillemot@ens-lyon.fr>
Sent: Sunday, March 19, 2023 6:41 AM
To: VSG <Vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: [Vsg] Prof. Nguyen The Anh passed away (1936-2023)

Dear all,

We come to you with very sad news. Our dear Professor, colleague and friend Nguyen The Anh passed away in his home in France today.

Our thoughts are with his family and friends.

Claire Tran, François Guillemot, Pascal Bourdeaux and all his former students and colleagues.

---

15 parvis René Descartes
BP 7000, 69342 Lyon cedex 07
www.ens-lyon.fr