Aug 05, 2001 02:42 AM
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'She turns into the room which is another garden - this one made up of trees and bowers painted over its walls and ceiling. The man lies on the bed, his body exposed to the breeze, and he turns his head slowly towards her as she enters.
Michael Ondattje starts this novel with a description of two people living in a bomb damaged villa in Italy towards the end of the war. Its two occupants are a young nurse and her badly burnt patient, who she believes to be an Englishman.
At this point neither character has a name. We see the nurse caring tenderly for her patient, reading to him from books she finds in the villas library. The patient talks to the nurse, revealing how his burnt body was rescued from the desert by a tribe of Bedouin, and how they treated his wounds and used his knowledge to help them.
Later two more people will come to stay, one who has a curiosity about the patient, and a family friend of the nurse. The other a young Indian sapper who has come to clear the area of bombs and mines.
The story develops as the patient tells reminices to the others about his life.
The English Patient... He lies in his room, flat on his back, he needs to use a hearing aid. His only posession is a book, 'The Histories' by Herodotus, into which he has glued pages from other books and his own notes. The nurse thinks that he is English, information about him only comes when he recalls his memories to the others.
His story gives Ondattje the opportunity for some beautiful descriptive writing about the desert, and the passionate yet destructive affair he has had with Katherine Clifton.
'A list of wounds.
The various colours of the bruise - bright russet leading to brown. The plate she walked across the room with, flinging its contents aside, and broke across his head, the blood rising up into the straw hair. The fork that entered the back of his shoulder, leaving its bite marks the doctor suspected were caused by a fox.
He would step into an embrace with her, glancing first to see what moveable objects were around. He would meet her in public with bruises or a bandaged head and explain about the taxi jerking to a halt so he had hit the open side window.
Hanah .. The Canadian nurse who had stayed behind to care for her patient who was dying and too ill to move. Left with limited supplies,including some morphine, she finds fruit in the garden, and starts to grow her own vegetables. Her entertainment is reading from the books in the bombed library.
Caravaggio.. Another Canadian who was a friend of Hana's now dead father. He has come looking for the English patient , because he thinks he knows his true identity. He has been a thief in the past and recruited as a spy for the war. His hands have been mutilated and it was while in an army hospital that he heard about Hana and her patient.
Lieutenant Kirpal Singh or Kip... He has been sent to the area with Hardy to clear mines and unexploded bombs. He errects his army tent in the grounds of the Villa, and is invited to share meals with Hana and Caravaggio in the house, he also visits the patient.
We see him as a very ordered young man, a Sikh, clean , methodical and polite, and excellent at his job. Kips character shows ability over racism, Lord Suffolk picks him to be on his team because of his intelligence, over many British candidates.
Although his allegiance to the British is to be tested, Kip is an Indian who feels that it is right to volunteer and help the British fight the Germans. This is counterbalanced by his brother who is only talked about, but has an anti- british viewpoint.
Hana finds Kip himself attractive, and difference in colour appears to be exotic , even erotic to her.
'She learns all the varieties of his darkness.
the colour of his forearm against the colour of his neck. The colour of his palms, his cheek, the skin under his turban. The darkness of fingers separating red and black wires, or against bread he picks off the gunmetal plate he still uses for food.'
This is another book of fiction shaped by true historical events, so that you almost think it is a work of historical fact.
The gripping descriptions of Kip dealing with bombs is based on research of the bombs and methods of defusing used at the time. As is the popular music of the time that he likes to listen to on his crystal set.
Michael Ondattje was born in Sri Lanka and now lives in Toronto. Maybe this is why for me Kip is the most well drawn character although not the eponymous hero.
I read this book after seeing the film, and for me the book is much faster moving than the film, which although quite long didn't deal in depth with all the characters.
The book itself is not excessively long 302 pages, but it is one of those you will want to take the time to read rather than skim.
