In the last days of 1964, a history lecturer from Hanoi University and a delegation of cadres from the fields of culture, education, health, cinema, etc. set out for the South. In the civilian delegation that year, he was among the intellectuals who volunteered to take up arms and go but did not have to "put down their pens and ink". His backpack was heavy with textbooks and treatises. He set out as a pedagogue and historian to take on a common responsibility with the experts in the delegation: Developing education for the liberated areas and building a team of lecturers for a university preparing to be established on the base of the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam. Many people recognized him. That was Ca Le Hien - the author of the poem Remembering the Rain of the Homeland, which won second prize in the Literature and Arts newspaper's poetry contest in 1960.The walking path across Truong Son to the South was steep and rugged, but it was the path back to his motherland. The arduous and sacrificial battle ahead forced each person to choose a code name or a pen name, and he chose Le Anh Xuan as his pen name. As a son of Ben Tre, following his father to the North, receiving careful education and training, Le Anh Xuan matured very early. Graduating from the History department, he was kept at the school, in the World History department. As a young, intelligent, and naturally talented lecturer, he was chosen by the State to study abroad. The path to personal success and a scientific career opened up before him, but Le Anh Xuan refused. He chose the second secret path across Truong Son, returning to his motherland. The path to battle, in his heart, became the path of convergence of two great loves: Love for the homeland and love for the country. In 1965, the US massively sent troops to the South, igniting an extremely fierce local war. The battlefield situation changed, and the Central Office for Southern Vietnam decided to shelve the plan to build a university. From the Education Subcommittee, Le Anh Xuan transferred to the Arts Subcommittee, and began working as a journalist and front-line reporter.
Since that year, the liaison routes and the battlefield trenches began to bear the footprints of the patriotic Ben Tre journalist. Thanks to his historical sense and the heart of a poet, Le Anh Xuan quickly grasped the philosophical depth and poetic depth of the revolutionary reality of the South. Writing articles, poems, memoirs, and telling stories about heroes, the pen name Le Anh Xuan has become a familiar and beloved name for readers of the Liberation Literature Magazine and compatriots in both the North and the South. The poetry collections The Crowing of the Rooster (1965), Nowhere Like in the South (1965), the epic poem Nguyen Van Troi (1968), the memoirs Keeping the Land, the poems later published in the collection Coconut Flowers (1971)... moved compatriots and soldiers across the country and immediately recognized the style of a talent who had signaled through Remembering the Rain of the Homeland in the Past. Le Anh Xuan still roamed the battlefields. The poems "Dua oi", "Ve Ben Tre", "Troi ve que noi", "Khong dau nhu o mien Nam" (Nowhere like in the South) were continuously broadcast on the radio waves of the Voice of Vietnam, touching the souls of compatriots and soldiers across the country. With a desire to contribute, a desire to explore reality and create art, the poet refused to sit still in the base. He sought every opportunity to participate in battles, not content with the safe, albeit legitimate, position of a poet. He did not want to just stand at a distance, to be a witness to history. In 1968, Le Anh Xuan set out, entering the second phase of the Mau Than General Offensive. Before leaving, he sent to the Editorial Board of the Liberation Literature Magazine a poem he had stayed up all night writing. It was a poem about the heroic, proud and tragic death of an unknown soldier at Tan Son Nhat airport: The poem "Vietnam's Standing Posture". It was heartbreaking that the author never saw his poem printed in the newspaper again. On May 24, 1968, Le Anh Xuan sacrificed himself on the western front of Saigon. Le Anh Xuan passed away but his Vietnamese Stance remained. The poem quickly became the first favorite song of generations of gunmen. When imagining the liberation soldier who sacrificed himself in a standing shooting position on the runway, leaving without leaving his name..., many colleagues and friends of the same faculty at Hanoi University of Science remembered the slender figure and bright face of teacher Ca Le Hien years ago in the North. Because the Fatherland needed him, he put aside a scientific career. But in return, he created for himself a poetic career. And most importantly, through poetry and through his example of fighting and sacrificing, he contributed to "making history". For the past half century, in the minds of millions of students, university students and readers of Vietnamese poetry, Le Anh Xuan is a hero. To pay tribute and preserve the priceless spiritual relics of the martyrs who were cadres and students of Hanoi University of Science in the past, the University of Social Sciences and Humanities has published the book Remaining with Time. In the list of biographies and pages of martyrs' literature, besides the names: Writer, Hero of the People's Armed Forces - Martyr Chu Cam Phong, Journalist - Martyr Hong Tan (who sacrificed next to Le Anh Xuan), Poet - Martyr Nguyen Trong Dinh, Poet - Martyr Vu Dung ... the name Le Anh Xuan has opened a new page, shining as a teacher - poet of the battlefield. On May 18, 2011, the University of Social Sciences and Humanities, Vietnam National University, Hanoi organized a discussion about the life and career of Le Anh Xuan. At this cultural and poetry forum, the staff and students of the School were very moved and excited to hear that the City Party Committee and the People's Committee of Ho Chi Minh City had directed the Union of Literature and Arts Associations of the City to build a dossier to propose the State to posthumously award the title of Hero of the Armed Forces to Martyr Le Anh Xuan. Also from this discussion, the diary pages of Le Anh Xuan, read by the teacher, Meritorious Artist Ca Le Hong (the Martyr's sister), moved the hall. The scientific staff, lecturers, students and School leaders immediately realized that Le Anh Xuan's Diary was a priceless relic. The work was urgently deployed. Thanks to the efforts of collecting, searching and contacting the Veterans Association, the School Board of Directors, and the cooperation and assistance of the Martyr's family and the Ben Tre Provincial Museum, the manuscript of Le Anh Xuan's Diary was printed. The publication of the Diary is a response to the common wishes and expectations of many cultural and scientific agencies, local government organizations and poetry-loving readers nationwide. The Ho Chi Minh City Culture and Literature Publishing House volunteered to publish this diary. In addition to the goal of introducing a cultural and ideological heritage, for the Publishing House, the book also has the meaning of a tribute to colleagues. Because the Liberation Literature Magazine, where poet Le Anh Xuan worked, was the cultural organization that was the predecessor of the Ho Chi Minh City Culture and Literature Publishing House today.
In this edition, we are not really confident about the textual aspect. The reason is that in the original Diary there are still many blank periods (perhaps due to the intense fighting that interrupted the diary writing or maybe these periods were written in other notebooks?). In addition, there are still many sentences written by the author in a symbolic style, which cannot be deciphered. When writing the diary, the author could not know that his private matters, his "monologues" would one day come to light, becoming a public story for millions of people to know. In compliance with the specific rules of the diary genre and respecting the authenticity of the original work, we request that the Publisher keep the content as it is. On the occasion of the release of Le Anh Xuan's Diary to readers, the University of Social Sciences and Humanities would like to sincerely thank the Ho Chi Minh City Culture and Literature Publishing House for their cooperation, sincerely thank the Martyr's family for their great help, thank the coordination, support of information and historical documents of the writers: Anh Duc, Le Van Thao, Vien Phuong, Tu Son, Le Quang Trang, especially the staff of Ben Tre Museum - Ben Tre province during the editing process of this book. On the occasion of the publication of the diary, we earnestly hope to continue to receive to the Traditional Department of the University of Social Sciences and Humanities, Vietnam National University, Hanoi (336 Nguyen Trai, Thanh Xuan, Hanoi) the memorabilia, souvenir photos, and posthumous pages of Martyr Le Anh Xuan that may still be kept scattered in the notebooks of writers, journalists, and comrades and colleagues who worked and fought with the Martyr in the past. While waiting for the opportunity to add more documents and new diary pages, the University of Social Sciences and Humanities would like to respectfully introduce Le Anh Xuan's Diary to staff, students of Hanoi National University and readers near and far.
Hanoi, on Vietnamese Teachers' Day 2011
Party Committee, Board of Directors, Veterans Association of University of Social Sciences and Humanities, Vietnam National University, Hanoi
