 2020 edition | |
| Author | Suon Sorin |
|---|---|
| Original title | ព្រះអាទិត្យថ្មីរះលើផែនដីចាស់ |
| Translator | Roger Nelson |
| Language | Khmer |
| Genre | Romance |
Publication date | 1962 |
| Publication place | Cambodia |
| Media type | Print (Paperback) |
A New Sun Rises Over the Old Land is a Cambodian novel published in 1961 and the only published work of Suon Sorin who disappeared during the Khmer Rouge regime. It has become a "canonical novel" [1] and an iconic work of modern Cambodian literature. [2]
A New Sun Rises over the Old Land, is set during the reign of Norodom Sihanouk in Cambodia. The Cambodian independence of 1953 sets a chronological marker of a before and after in the novel of Suon Sorin. First published in 1961, eight years after Cambodia gained independence from French colonial rule, the novel offers a fresh view into a period of profound transformation in Cambodia during the Sangkum era. [3]
Sam, with his wife Soy, leaves his native Battambang province, in order to flee from armed conflict between the Issarak and the French colonial forces. He reaches Phnom Penh but in capital city, he struggles with the impossible livelihood of daily wagers[ clarification needed ] driving his cyclo or rickshaw, taking turns with his wife. As they fall into poverty, their life is made impossible when their pedicab is repossessed and they are eventually evicted from their home, without any mercy shown by their owner and landlord. Without a penny left and with no one ready to lend them money, Soy puts herself at the service of a rich merchant.
The author of the novel, Suon Sorin, was born in 1930 in the Sangker district of Battambang, Cambodia. A New Sun Rises Over the Old Land is his only known work of fiction. He is believed to have died during the Khmer Rouge period.
The book is about 100 pages-long and is divided into 19 chapters, each of them 3-6 pages. Except for the conclusion and prologue, in which cyclo rider Sam is on his way to attend a National Congress as a delegate, the entire book is set in flashback three years after the independence of Cambodia. [4] It is a form of Cambodian zeitgeist which can be read as a prescriptive tale. [5] Looking back in time, it also looks back with both praise and criticism at the evolution of Cambodian society. Thus, the author is more concerned with types and class than the individual, his novel trying to encompass the problems of this society as a whole. [6]
In the context of Southeast Asian committed literature of the 1960s which were concerned with solidarity in society and the fate of the poor, [7] the novel is a "singularly illuminating historical document of the new nation-offers a fresh view into a period of profound transformation in Cambodia." [8] His main character’s aspiration for a good life – guided by ethics, hard work and harmonious relations – echoes Sihanouk’s promise of modernisation, as well as the ambiguity of his tenuous ideological balance between monarchism, conservatism and “Buddhist socialism”. Sorin highlights Chinese and Vietnamese origins of the capitalist class through their names, and contrasts them with Sam.
In the literary movement of the Cambodian novel which emerged since the publication of Sophat by Rim Kin in 1938, the Khmer novels multiplied in 1960s with various tendencies. Whereas Soth Polin had given into the pessimism of existentialism, in such books as Life is pointless, Suon Sorin represents the hopes that were shared by many young Cambodians of his generation in the Sungkum as their country strived for independence. [9] While some, such as David Chander, have praised the novel, others, with retrospect, have criticized the novel as political propaganda [10] too naive and plain: "the glorification of the Sihanouk regime comes across as very toadying." [11] While not aiming directly at Suon Sorin, Jacques Népote and Khing Hoc Dy assert the quality of modern Cambodian literature (as opposed to the earlier classical literature) was “normally very poor” and that style of the writing from this period was often “careless and demagogic”. [12] The literary promotion of Sihanouk's policies was equaled in the visual arts by Cambodian painter Nhek Dim. [13]
Reading this passionate, absorbing novel, it’s poignant to re-enter a period that was filled for many Cambodians with optimism, autonomy and self-respect.
— David J. Chandler [3]
Sorin’s novel was a bestseller upon its release and remains widely read in contemporary Cambodia. In 1961, A New Sun Rises over the Old Land won the first Indradevi Literary Competition under the auspices of then-Head of State, King Father Norodom Sihanouk. [14] During his speech, King Sihanouk commented on the role of Cambodian writers holding “a responsibility not only to literature, but also to nation-building”.
It remains widely read in Cambodia today, and is still prescribed reading in many Cambodian schools and universities. [6]
In 2020, Fathers, a Khmer movie, had a script written as a palimpsest of the 1962 novel, using the cyclo of Phnom Penh as the battleground of social injustice in Cambodia. The film was submitted for the Academy awards. [15]
Excerpts of the book were translated into English in 1974 and praised as models of contemporary Cambodian language by the Foreign Service Institute. [16] The book was translated in full into English by Roger Nelson, curator at National Gallery Singapore, and published in 2019. [3] This translation received the 2022 A.L. Becker Southeast Asian Literature in Translation Prize from the Association of Asian Studies. [17]
Phnom Penh is the capital and most populous city of Cambodia. It has been the national capital since the French protectorate of Cambodia and has grown to become the nation's primate city and its economic, industrial, and cultural centre. Before Phnom Penh became capital city, Oudong was the capital of the country.
Norodom Sihanouk was a member of the Cambodian royal house who led the country as King and Prime Minister. In Cambodia, he is known as Samdech Euv. During his lifetime, Cambodia was under various regimes, from French colonial rule, a Japanese puppet state (1945), an independent kingdom (1953–1970), a military republic (1970–1975), the Khmer Rouge regime (1975–1979), a Vietnamese-backed communist regime (1979–1989), a transitional communist regime (1989–1993) to eventually another kingdom.
The National United Front for an Independent, Neutral, Peaceful and Cooperative Cambodia, commonly referred to as FUNCINPEC, is a royalist political party in Cambodia. Founded in 1981 by Norodom Sihanouk, it began as a resistance movement against the People's Republic of Kampuchea (PRK) government. In 1982, it formed a resistance pact with the Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea (CGDK), together with the Khmer People's National Liberation Front (KPNLF) and the Khmer Rouge. It became a political party in 1992.
Norodom Sihamoni is King of Cambodia. He became King on 14 October 2004, a week after the abdication of his father, Norodom Sihanouk.
Norodom Chakrapong is a Cambodian politician, businessman and former major-general of the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces. He is the fourth son of Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia and also a half-brother of the current king, Norodom Sihamoni. Chakrapong started his career as a military pilot in 1963. After Sihanouk was overthrown in 1970, Chakrapong spent time under house arrest, then in Beijing as the Head of Protocol of then-Prince Sihanouk, afterwards living overseas before he joined the Funcinpec in 1981 and fought against Vietnamese occupation as a commander of the Armée Nationale Sihanoukiste. In 1991, Chakrapong left Funcinpec to join the Cambodian People's Party (CPP) and served as the Deputy Prime Minister of Cambodia between 1992 and 1993. When the CPP lost the 1993 general elections, Chakrapong led a secession attempt in 1993. In 1994, he was accused of joining a failed coup attempt which led him to be sent into exile. After Chakrapong was pardoned in 1998, he founded a private airline company, Royal Phnom Penh Airways. The airlines later stopped all operations in early 2006.
Soth Polin is a Cambodian writer. He was born in the hamlet of Chroy Thmar, Kampong Siem District, Kampong Cham Province, Cambodia. His maternal great-grandfather was the poet Nou Kan. He grew up speaking both French and Khmer. Throughout his youth, he immersed himself in the classical literature of Cambodia and, at the same time, the literature and philosophy of the West.
Cambodia–Russia relations are the bilateral relations of Cambodia and Russia. The relations between both countries were strong since the Soviet era. Russia has an embassy in Phnom Penh. Cambodia has an embassy in Moscow. Both countries are full members of the East Asia Summit.
Keat Chhon is a Cambodian politician. He belongs to the Cambodian People's Party and was elected to represent Phnom Penh in the National Assembly of Cambodia in 2003. He was the Minister for Economy and Finance from 1994 to 2013. By 2018, he has retired from all public offices.
The 1997 Cambodian coup d'état took place in Cambodia from July to September 1997. As a result, co-premier Hun Sen ousted the other co-premier Norodom Ranariddh. At least 32 people were killed during the coup.
The Khmer Writers Association, also known as the Association of Khmer Writers, the Association des Ecrivains Khmers, or the Association of Cambodian Writers, was established in 1954 or 1956, and re-established in 1993 as a non-governmental organization. Formerly located at 465 Monivong Blvd, it is currently located at St. 244, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
Nhek Dim was a Cambodian artist, painter, writer and composer.
Sophat was the first Cambodian romance novel written in 1938 by Rim Kin and was published in 1942. Along with Kolab Pailin and Phka Srapoun, Sophat is widely regarded as the “first” Cambodian novel and is considered one of the three classic novels of Khmer literature, though Tuek Tonle Sap, by Kim Hak had been printed in 1939.
Chuth Khay / ខ្ជិត ខ្យៃ is a Cambodian writer and translator. He was born in 1940 in Koh Somrong, Cambodia, an island on the Mekong about one hundred kilometers north of the capital. The youngest son, he was the only one in a family of ten children to attend a Western school. He pursued primary and secondary studies in Kampong Cham. While working as a teacher of French, he attended classes at the Royal University of Phnom Penh and, in 1968, received his law degree. Opposed to the monarchy, he became a legal advisor to the Ministry of Defense after Sihanouk's removal from power in 1970. From 1973 to 1974, he served as interim dean of the law school. In 1973, he published two successful collections of short stories: Ghouls, Ghosts, and Other Infernal Creatures and Widow of Five Husbands. He also wrote for Soth Polin's newspaper, Nokor Thom (នគរធំ), and published his books and translations with its publishing house. Forced into the countryside by the Khmer Rouge, he miraculously escaped death by pretending to be mute. Granted refuge in France in 1980 and French citizenship, he took the name Chuth Chance, for receiving a second chance in life. He worked for several years as a taxi driver, and is now retired and lives near Paris.
Khuon Sokhampu was a Cambodian linguist and phonetics scholar, who was among the many intellectuals who were exterminated by the Khmer Rouge regime. Along with Iv Koeus and Keng Vannsak, Khuon Sokhamphu was one of the three pioneers of Khmer linguistics and grammar.
The battle of Pailin also known as the Siege of Pailin is an armed conflict which extended from 1989 to 1997 as the last military act of the Khmer Rouge insurgency which took place in the Northwest of Cambodia in the last military stronghold of the Khmer Rouge.
Bernard Col de Monteiro was a Khmer Catholic of Portuguese descent who served the Cambodian monarchy during the second half of the 19th century, and was "one of the major mandarins of King Norodom" and a "member of the new-old national élite à la française" at the beginning the French protectorate of Cambodia.
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Ly Theam Teng was a Sino-Khmer literatus who authored many books including novels which have become classics of Cambodian literature, before he died of exhaustion under the Khmer Rouge in 1978.
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Thon Chey, Thmenh Chey, or Dhanañjaya is the protagonist of a Khmer narrative tradition. He is paired with his symmetrical opposite, A Chey. While insufficient research does not yet allow scholars to identify the oldest known extant publication about the folk hero, its background is set during the Cambodian Golden Age, or the Angkorian era, even though other scholars date it to the 16th- or 17th-century feudal society of Cambodia. The character may have been based on a historical person. According to Khmer scholar Khing Hoc Dy, Thon Chey is "the best-known of all Khmer tales and legends."