Tan Da

(pen name of Nguyen Khac Hieu). Born 1888 in Khe Thuong, Son Tay Province; died June 1939 in Hanoi. Vietnamese writer.

In 1921, Tan Da founded a publishing house; he was also the editor of the journal Hiu Than (1921) and the Annam Journal (1926). Tan Da wrote one of the first works of modern Vietnamese prose, the novella A Little Dream (1917), about the author’s imaginary voyage around the world. Tan Da was also a poet and a precursor of the New Poetry literary movement of the 1930’s. In his poetry he often drew on folk songs, and many of his own poems became folk songs. His verse expressed patriotism and Utopian dreams. Tan Da translated Chinese poetry of the T’ang period into Vietnamese.