The formation of modern Vietnamese literature is linked to the spread of Western bourgeois ideas and the "King Qin Movement" that was patriotic and anti-French. At that time, many poets and writers themselves were patriots and leaders of the Qinwang Movement. Anti-French patriotic literature was the mainstream of Vietnamese literary circles at that time.
The most influential writer in modern Vietnam is the southern poet Nguyen Dinh Chiang (1822~1888). He was born in an intellectual family in Binh Duong County, Jiading Province. He became a scholar in 1843 and became blind in 1848. After the French army invaded and occupied six southern provinces in 1861, he refused to cooperate with them and lived in seclusion. He interacted with patriots and used his pen as a weapon to fight against France.
The long poem "The Legend of Liaoyunxian", an early work, describes the unfortunate experiences and tortuous marriage of Liaoyunxian and Qiao Yuee, a scholar from the Qing Dynasty. It exposes the evil evils of society and criticizes the moral decay of feudal society. Has an anti-feudal tendency. But the work also reflects that the writer himself still has the feudal consciousness of Confucianism's three cardinal principles and five constant principles. Ruan Ting Chiang's best works are the more than 50 poems, several sacrificial essays and poems he created. "The Sacrifice of the Diligent Martyrs" is not only a hymn to commemorate the heroes who died on the battlefield, but also a proclamation to denounce the traitors. Ruan Tingzheng also praised the rebel soldiers who fought tenaciously against the enemy in many other poems, portraying the image of the honest, hard-working, brave and simple rebels.
The writers who were active in Vietnam’s modern literary world at the same time as Nguyen Dinh Chiang include Phan Van Chi, Nguyen Xuan Win, Nguyen Quang Bi, Phan Dinh Phung, etc. Ruan Guangbi himself is a patriotic leader of the "King Qin Movement", and his "Yu Feng Poetry Collection" written in Chinese can be regarded as a record of the struggle of the "King Qin Movement".
At the beginning of the 20th century, French colonists promoted the new pinyin script of Latin in Vietnam, which in turn promoted the development of Vietnamese literature. The creations of the famous patriotic poet Phan Pei Chu (1867~1940) pushed modern Vietnamese literature into a new historical stage.