Dire l’indicible: Children, trauma and silences in Kim Thúy’s Ru and Grace Ly’s Jeune fille modèle

Abstract

This article articulates the notion of silences that endure in the aftermath of the Indochina war and the traumatic impact on children. Through an analysis of two Francophone texts, Grace Ly’s Jeune fille modèle and Kim Thúy’s Ru, this study demonstrates that it is silence which evokes and solidifies the trauma experienced by victims of war; this is transmitted to their children despite attempts at secrecy and endeavours to protect children from such trauma. It examines the ways in which narrating trauma and breaking silences play a role in recuperating both history and personal history. In foregrounding the voices of those who have died and haunt subsequent generations, the article discusses the silences that pervade Ru and Jeune fille modèle in order to gauge the extent to which narrating stories, finding one’s voice and breaking silences become a means of obtaining freedom and alleviating some of the dolour of war and losses. In so doing, it analyses the ways in which children enable these healing processes to take place and eventually permit multiple voices to break through the narrative fibre in order to create redemption stories.