HCM City (VNA) - Thefirst book of Cham fairytales collected and translated into Vietnamese byteacher Kinh Duy Trinh of Binh Thuan province has been released.   

Truyen co Cham (Fairytales of theCham People) contains 25 stories with illustrations by Ton Nu Thi Bich Tram ofKim Dong Publishing House.

They feature stories of gods, forests, animals, friendship and love and offer awindow into Cham history, culture and lifestyles.

Kim Dong has signed a copyright deal with the author.  

Trinh, 61, who lives in Palay Chavet village in Tuy Phong district, used towork as a Cham language teacher at pedagogic colleges and universities in theregion before moving to the provincial Department of Education andTraining.  

He and his colleagues have written and edited 20 books in the Cham ethnic languagethat are used in primary schools in Binh Thuan and other provinces.

He has spent years collecting and translating Cham fairytales into Vietnamese.

Trinh said: “My collection Truyen co Cham features the bestfairytales of the Cham people. Through the book, I wanted to preserve and takeCham culture and literature to young people of different nationalities in Vietnam.”

For the compilation and translation, he said he used Cham-Vietnamese-French, Cham-Frenchand Cham-Vietnamese dictionaries.  

“I hope my books will help young readers, particularly children, improve theirmind and character.”

He said the next book of the series has been completed and will be printedearly next year.-VNA