This morning, students in Ho Chi Minh City completed the first exam subject, literature, in the 10th grade exam. As the first candidate to leave the exam site at Vo Truong Toan Secondary School (District 1), Le Nguyen Truc Linh, a student at Tran Van On Secondary School (District 1), could not hide her joy because the difficulty of the exam was only moderate, helping her do well on the exam and hopefully achieve a score of 8.

According to the female student, the 2023 literature exam of Ho Chi Minh City has the theme "Letting thoughts speak out...", with a series of questions emphasizing the importance of frankly expressing opinions and feelings to understand and respect each other in many relationships, from family, society to the country and oneself.

"Although there are many 'open' questions, I still need to study to apply them correctly. The social argumentation question is the most challenging for me because it takes a long time to 'absorb' what the question wants to ask," Linh shared.

Do Nhu Khanh Linh, a student at Vo Truong Toan Secondary School, was excited when the exam paper both "advised" candidates to choose the prose work Ivory Comb or the poem Talk to Your Child if writing about family affection, and encouraged reading habits through the form of submitting entries to the book club. "The exam paper was much easier than I imagined, so I felt no pressure at all while doing the test, and did very well," the female student said.

Bringing his pet dog named "Den" to the exam this morning, Le Vu Bao Chau, a student at Tran Van On Secondary School, introduced this as a "lucky charm" that helped him "get lucky" to complete the literature exam well. Applying literary theory elements in the test, Chau said that candidates only need to memorize poems, and do not need to memorize because "the questions do not ask for any specific works like before".

Meanwhile, Nguyen Tuan Huy, a student at Van Lang Secondary School, chose to write about the poem "Comrade" by author Chinh Huu to emphasize the importance of solidarity with the young generation, both in wartime and peacetime. According to Huy, the topic "Letting thoughts be expressed in words..." gives him the opportunity to present many different perspectives, especially in the context that young people today often close their hearts to adults in real life but like to "let loose" on social networks.

According to statistics from the Department of Education and Training of Ho Chi Minh City, there are about 96,000 candidates registered and will take the 10th grade entrance exam, with the subjects of literature, foreign language, math (if registering for regular 10th grade) and specialized and integrated subjects (if registering for specialized schools and classes; integrated).