Tâ´M Cám
“Tâ´m Cám” is one of the most iconic tales in Vietnamese folklore. A story of the escalating rivalry of two sisters, it’s been referenced, retold, and readapted countless times in Vietnam in various mediums, from book to movie.
Tâ´m, a beautiful and kind young woman, is treated as a servant by her stepmother and stepsister after her father’s death. With the assistance of a magic fish, she comes to the attention of the king and marries him. After her marriage, her envious stepsister, Cám, repeatedly kills her, and Tâ´m repeatedly reincarnates in various forms until she escapes the palace. The king, mourning for her, finally finds her and takes her back home. Tâ´m gets her revenge on her stepsister by suggesting that she take a scalding bath in order to whiten her skin. Cám dies, boiled alive.
I’ve always been struck by the relationship between the sisters, and how it’s always driven by Cám’s jealousy of her sister’s beauty: there are all sorts of rather nasty undercurrents there, and I wanted to tell a new version that would have sisters who stuck together in spite of all odds. And I kept the bath, too, except in a radically different context!
—Aliette de Bodard