Solitary Envoi is our segment focused on works of art created behind prison walls. Sometimes these can be powerful songs, or inspiring poetry. But in this week’s episode, Loa’s Quyên Ngô introduces us to something quite unexpected: dolls.
This is a story about love in limbo--that is, love in a time of uncertainty. The “limbo” in this story takes us back to post-war Việt Nam -- a time of crippling instability and uncertainty. The love is between a singer and a musician.
In a jail cell outside of Sài Gòn, a prisoner’s painful tumor is left untreated unless she confesses to her alleged crimes. That's the case of land rights activist, Trần Thị Thúy, a woman who’s been punished so severely in prison, she can no longer walk straight. Loa’s Mây Trần tells her story.
For the activists from Việt Nam, lessons in resilience and courage were immediately put to the test following the study tour. All seven who traveled to Myanmar were detained upon their return to Việt Nam and endured long hours of interrogation. Their detention did not come a surprise, but they are a reminder of the risks that Vietnamese activists take when they participate in peaceful democracy work. In this week’s Solitary Envoi, we hear about what happened in the interrogation room.
In this week’s "Solitary Envoi," Quyên Ngô takes a look at the linguistic choices activists have made in expressing their protest.
Psychological abuse. Beatings. Solitary Confinement. This is the mistreatment Diệu has and continues to experience at prison No. 5 in Thanh Hóa province in Việt Nam. He refers to this persecution in a letter that was snuck out of his prison cell.
In "Solitary Envoi", we return to works of art by the politically repressed. Mây Trần brings us the story behind a song written from within Việt Nam's prison jail cells: Trả Lại Cho Dân (Return to the People).
We close our first episode with our “Solitary Envoi” segment, which features written works that inspire or are written by the politically repressed in Việt Nam.