Abstract

Tran Dung’s historical memoirs go beyond a mere recounting of the past; they embody a dialogic mechanism between history and the present, between the power of events and the power of language. This study examines Tran Dung’s historical memoirs through the lens of discourse theory, aiming to clarify how this genre interweaves the codes of “truth” and “fiction” in its representation of history. By combining interdisciplinary, typological, and analytical-synthetic methods, the research reveals that the “truth code” is expressed through historical elements - characters and events - subject to the influence of social power, whereas the “fictional code” manifests in the “metatextual” structure, reflecting the writer’s creative agency. The originality of the study lies in its identification of discourse as a distinctive form of power that directly participates in organizing, regulating, and interpreting history. Furthermore, the study defines the hybrid generic characteristics and expressive strategies in Tran Dung’s historical memoirs. In doing so, it highlights the writer’s role as a discursive subject - both witness and creator of history through language - thereby contributing to the expansion of research directions on contemporary Vietnamese historical memoirs in relation to poetics, culture, and society.