Ep. 41 - An American Narrative: A Conversation with Author Viet Thanh Nguyen Winner of The Pulitzer for Fiction

The impact of entrepreneurship on the America dream is too often
taken for granted. Consider Pulitzer Prize Winning Author Viet
Thanh Nguyen, who escaped Vietnam as a refugee with most of his
family in the 70s, almost immediately torn from his mother's arms
when they hit the ground in America. Then a few years later,
reunited with his brother and parents who started their own
successful, yet back breaking grocery store business in San Jose,
California. 


An observer, Viet learned how to be and not to be, absorbing the
tenacity and fierceness of his entrepreneurial parents. His
journey from boyhood to manhood in a country studded at every
point with racism and hypocrisy manifests beautifully in his
Pulitzer Prize winning novel "The Sympathizer." 


Host JinJa Birkenbeuel interviews Viet on this special episode.
Viet's story will surprise you, as he unpacks and deconstructs
American-style racism through his own cultural lens. 


Follow Viet on Insta and Twitter @viet_t_nguyen. Purchase his
books at http://www.bookshop.org. "The Sympathizer" is available
here
https://bookshop.org/books/the-sympathizer-a-novel-pulitzer-prize-for-fiction/9780802124944
and his collaboration with his son Ellison "Chicken Of The Sea"
https://bookshop.org/books/chicken-of-the-sea/9781944211738.


#BlackLivesMatter #TheSympathizer #Pulitzer #Refugee #Vietnam


Follow our show on http://www.instagram.com/honestfieldguide or
at http://www.twitter.com/thehonestfield. We would love your
dollars to keep going! We can take a donation to support our
podcast here and we will shout you our when you do it on an
upcoming podcast:
https://anchor.fm/the-honest-field-guide/support. 


Text The Honest Field Guide at ‪(312) 445-0903‬ Send us a voice
message and we will record it on an upcoming episode:
https://anchor.fm/the-honest-field-guide/message. The podcast is
recorded and produced by Birk Creative: Designing visual
identities and multichannel strategies to help brands establish,
grow, scale, exit and keep up with the pace of change. Visit
birkcreative.com. Music found on this episode is available on
Apple here https://music.apple.com/us/artist/utah-carol/137984081
and provided courtesy Utah Carol (ASCAP). All content Birkdesign
Inc. This podcast represents the personal views of JinJa
Birkenbeuel, CEO of Birk Creative and its employees.