Celebrating the 25th anniversary of its publication, the
Diasporic Vietnamese Artists Network and Texas Tech University Press are proud to release a newly updated
version of Watermark: Vietnamese American Poetry & Prose, the seminal
anthology of Vietnamese American literature. Contextualized by a new foreword
from Isabelle Thuy Pelaud and seasoned with new voices, Watermark: Vietnamese American Poetry & Prose, 25th Anniversary
Edition takes its place as a generational work of eclectic and essential
voices.
Edited by Barbara Tran, Monique Truong, and Khoi Luu,
this updated edition of Watermark
continues to center Vietnamese American literature, whose emergence it
celebrated upon its initial publication in 1998. Again, some of the most innovative
contemporary Vietnamese American writers, such as Truong Tran, lê thị diễm thúy, and Dao Strom, explore thematic and stylistic territory previously
overlooked in other collections, which have traditionally focused on war. New
voices such as Nam Le, Anvi Hoàng, and Vinh Nguyen are included in this new edition,
raising the number of pieces from forty to fifty-four.
Watermark lifts
all constraints, leaving the works to reset the boundaries for themselves. And
they do—using poetry, fiction, and experimental forms to venture further into
the intricacies of the Vietnamese American psyche. A work equal measures
foundational and pathbreaking, now available again for a new generation of
readers—an essential collection not to be missed.