Weaving Golden Threads: The Bookcase Worth the Family's Fortune of Nguyen An Ninh

Huge bookshelf from many sources

Revolutionary Nguyen An Ninh had a special love for books. Writing about her father in the memoir Nguyen An Ninh "I'm just the blowing wind" , Mrs. Nguyen Thi Minh provided information: "My father was smart, he understood what he heard at school, and when he got home he just read more books. My grandfather bought many books for students who went abroad, and for people who stayed at Chieu Nam Lau to read. My father was fascinated by the bookshelf of Chieu Nam Lau, and with all the money his aunt gave him, he searched for books to bring back." When he grew up, the patriot had a huge bookshelf of ideas, where his friends would come to read and learn. Mrs. Truong Thi Sau, the revolutionary's wife, remembered her husband's bookshelf in the memoir With Him Through Life : "Mr. Ninh's bookshelf had thousands of books, many of them by Marx and Lenin."

Patriot Nguyen An Ninh PHOTO: DOCUMENT

According to Mrs. Sau, the bookshelf was constantly supplemented through many sources: "On several trips to the West, Ninh brought back a lot of books, and sometimes asked the sailors to bring more. Ninh had a brother-in-law who was a customs officer, so any banned books would be put under his uncle's name so they wouldn't be searched. Thanks to that, Ninh had enough books by Marx, Engels, Lenin, from political books to specialized books on law, philosophy, classical literature..." In Phan Van Hum's memory, "Ninh's house had a lot of books. The two shelves had up to fifteen thousand books, all of which were valuable. Most of them were books on philosophy, literature, society, economics, or fine arts," the memoir Prison in the Big Prison recorded.

Phan Van Hum still informed that once Nguyen An Ninh was arrested, the French colonialists searched for evidence from books in his house but failed. This bookshelf later fell into the sights of the Japanese fascists. Mrs. Sau said that after invading Indochina, "they sent someone to negotiate with me to sell Mr. Ninh's bookshelf for one million dong. I absolutely refused to sell. I knew that all his books were revolutionary books, not only Mr. Ninh but all revolutionary activists needed them. I understood that the Japanese intended to buy the books for no other purpose than to sabotage the revolution". Looking at the Vietnamese Cultural Economy 1930-1980 (General Statistics Office, 1980), in 1940 the tax collected by the French colonialists in Vietnam was 87.1 million Indochinese dong, so one million dong at that time was a huge fortune.

Nutritious spiritual food

Professor Dang Thai Mai confided in his memoirs of his youth that his childhood impression of his family was "the outer room was filled with rows of large and small bookcases: where did all those books come from?". The bookcase, estimated to contain several thousand books, was called Tam Thai Son Library, which included precious books from Vietnamese and Chinese archives, classical books, modern books, philosophy, literature, Japanese, European and American history, and handwritten books. "When we were young, we felt scared when we looked at it", but when we grew up, its usefulness was revealed when "this bookcase, for us over a dozen years later, was truly spiritual food that was both interesting and useful".

The work Les Miserables (Victor Hugo) Huy Can read when he was a student

PHOTO: NATIONAL LIBRARY OF FRANCE

As a professional revolutionary, Le Duan opened a Thuan Hoa bookstore in Hue , but he was not just a bookstore owner. When To Huu was a student, he came into contact with Le Duan and was guided to read theoretical books. Later, he understood that "Le Duan did not appear publicly, on the surface he was just a normal political bookstore owner, but we all understood that he was the highest leader of the Regional Party Committee", his memoir Remembering a Time wrote.

Minister of Agriculture Cu Huy Can, author of the poetry collection Sacred Fire, still remembers the memories associated with books during his school years when he was awarded by his teacher for his academic achievements: "That year I was awarded the best prize in class, with a tall stack of books, all of which were textbooks for upper grades in French: French tips books, French history books, Indochina geography books, math books, reading books Going Around France , National Literature textbooks compiled by Tran Trong Kim, history books also compiled by Tran Trong Kim, and even the book Five Flowers by Jean Marquet [...] The fragrance of the paper, the ink, and the book covers left a deep impression on us children," the Twin Memoirs informed.

Such book rewards are highly educational, instilling a love of exploring knowledge in students. Huy Can still remembers his teacher Phan Tien "paying attention to stimulating students' love of reading, their interest in finding the good and the beautiful in books". But the future poet's love of reading came from his uncle during the years he lived in Quang Dien "I began to love reading thanks to my uncle's bookshelf, the magical bookshelf that opened up for me the magical world of literature from East to West, ancient and modern". Vietnamese books are Nom stories Thach Sanh, Phan Tran, Nu Tu Tai, Truyen Kieu, Chinh Phu Ngam ... foreign books are Nhung Nguoi Les Kho, Ba Nguoi Linh Lam Phao Thu, Thuyet Duong Dien Nghia, Dai Hoc, Trung Dung ...

"Our habit of buying books, collecting books, and accumulating good books originated from that. The bookshelf, and you yourself, gave me the love of reading, the love of discovering the pure joy in reading, in contact with the souls of the East and the West, past and present," Huy Can recalled.

Source: https://thanhnien.vn/det-nhung-soi-vang-tu-sach-bang-ca-gia-tai-cua-gia-dinh-nguyen-an-ninh-185250426212710952.htm