The+English+Patient

= // The English Patient // by Michael Ondaatje =

 " Profound, beautiful and heart-quickening ." -- //Toni Morrison //    "Sensuous, mysterious, rhapsodic, it transports the reader to another world...Ondaatje's most probing examination yet of the nature of identity." -- //San Fransisco Chronicle //   <span style="display: block; font-size: 110%; color: #800000; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif; text-align: right;"><span style="color: rgb(128,0,0); font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;">"A rare and spellbinding web of dreams." -- //<span style="color: rgb(128,0,0); font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;">Time // <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif; text-align: left;"><span style="color: rgb(128,0,0);"> <span style="display: block; font-size: 110%; color: #800000; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif; text-align: left;">"Lyrical... an exquisite ballet that takes place in the dark." --//Boston Sunday Globe// <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif; text-align: left;">

<span style="font-size: 120%; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;">** Author **

<span style="font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;">Philip Michael Ondaatje was born on September 12, 1943 in modern day Sri Lanka. His parents divorced when he was ten as a result of his father's excessive drinking habits. In the early 1960s Ondaatje emigrated to Canada at the age of 18, where he gained Canadian citizenship and enrolled in Bishop's University. Shortly after, he earned a Bachelor's degree from the University of Toronto in 1965 and a Masters degree from Queens University in 1967. Ondaatje became an English instructor at the University of Western Ontario and later taught English Literature at York University and Glendon College in Toronto. After gaining a literary reputation as a poet with his works "The Dainty Monsters", "The Man with Seven Toes", and "Rat Jelly"//,// Ondaatje became the first recipient of the Booker Prize with his novel //The English Patient.// The famous poet and novelist is also known for his films: __Sons of Captain Poetry Carry on Crime and Punishment__, __The Clinton Special__, and __Royal Canadian Hounds__.

**<span style="font-size: 120%; color: #008080; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;">Plot Summary <span style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; color: rgb(51,51,51); line-height: 18px; webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;"> <span style="font-size: 90%; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal; color: rgb(0,0,0);">The novel begins with the young nurse Hana caring for the burned English patient inside an abandoned Italian villa. The two recently decided to stay behind even after the other nurses and patients left the villa in search of a safer facility. Hana reads to the patient to pass the time as she attempts to avoid dangerous mines the Germans scattered across the countryside. An old family friend of Hana's named Caravaggio arrives at the villa one day with bandaged hands. She discovers he served as a thief for British intelligence and was tortured upon his capture. Caravaggio joins Hana and the patient living at the villa and they are soon joined by an Indian sapper by the name of Kip. Hana and Kip soon form a relationship that increases in intimacy until the end of the novel. In the meantime, the English patient confides details of his past like to Caravaggio. Under the influence of morphine, the patient talks about his love affair with a married woman named Katherine and his explorations of the Cairo desert. He then painfully explains that the affair ended and Katherine's husband, Geoffrey, somehow found out. Geoffrey attempts suicide and double-murder by trying to crash a plane into Almasy with his wife in the passenger seat. Geoffrey dies instantly, Katherine is seriously injured, and Almasy is left to carry Katherine safely into a nearby cave. He journeys across the desert to find help for his lover, but is thwarted by British forces who do not trust him. He returns to the cave later to uncover a hidden plane and fly Katherine's dead body to safety. The old plane is rotten, however, and catches fire as soon as Almasy gets it flying. The Beddouins find him completely burned on the desert floor and nurse his wounded body so Almasy can identify weapons for them. The patient continues to reveal his story, and Caravaggio's suspicion that he is not actually English is confirmed. These sections in the book alternate between the patient's point of view and Kip's. We learn about Kip's background as a Sikh, his training experience under Lord Suffolk, and his career as a bomb defuser in England. The beloved mentor, Lord Suffolk, dies while attempting to defuse a bomb, and Kip flees England to escape painful memories of his English "family" there. The novel switches back to present tense and Kip hears over the radio that the United States has dropped an atomic bomb on Japan.

<span style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;">"Italian Villa" by Joy McGinnis

<span style="font-size: 120%; color: #008080; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;">Major Characters

<span style="font-size: 90%; color: rgb(0,0,0); font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;">Almasy<span style="color: rgb(0,0,0);"> is the protagonist of the story from which the novel gets its name. Almasy is severely burned in a plane crash in the desert, leaving his face and flesh completely unrecognizable, and landing him in a war hospital in the hands of a nurse named Hana. Characters around the English Patient project their own desires, fears, and thoughts onto him, giving him a false, idealized identity. His true identity is not revealed until near the end of the book but the other characters, nevertheless, assume he is English. Almasy is fascinated by the desert and its ability to remain mysterious and untamed. He also engages in a secret love affair with his companion's wife, Katherine.

**<span style="font-size: 90%; color: rgb(0,0,0); font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;">**Hana** is young nurse who works for the Allies during World War II. Her years as a nurse have taught her to remain emotionally unattached to her patients and have given her wisdom and maturity beyond that of most people her age. Her transformation from a child to an adult throughout the story makes her the most dynamic character in the book. Hana becomes unusually unattached to the English patient while he is in her care and is in love with the idea of their relationship as caregiver and innocent saint.


 * Kip** is a Sikh from India who works for the Allies defusing bombs under British command. He faces a constant battle of racism as he is obeyed and respected by white men in his "sapper" unit while on duty, but ignored and rejected by the same men outside of work. Disagreements in his family combined with his life in a predominantly white nation produce Kip's reserved, well-behaved, detached personality. Ultimately, this detached personality hinders his ability to form close relationships and negatively affects his relationship with Hana. When Kip learns about the two atomic bombs dropped in Japan, his disgust for the Western world erupts and causes him to abandon everything associated with white men.


 * Carvaggio worked as a thief for British intelligence during the war until he was discovered and tortured by having his thumbs cut off. Carvaggio acts as a father figure to Hana and plays a key role in discovering the English patient's true identity.

Katherine Clifton is the young wife of Geoffrey Clifton who is having an extra-marital affair with Almasy. She is seemingly patient and soft spoken but is actually the origin of many deceptive and violent actions within the book.

Geoffrey Clifton** is a young Oxford graduate who shares Almasy's passion for the deserts of Cairo. He is originally oblivious to his wife's unfaithfulness but eventually discovers the secret and attempts to seek revenge on the cheating couple.

<span style="display: block; font-size: 120%; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif; text-align: center;">Michael Franti - Bomb The World
<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, serif;">Please tell me the reason Behind the colors that you fly Love just one nation And the whole world we divide You say you're "sorry" Say, "there is no other choice" But god bless the people them Who cannot raise their voice (chorus) We can chase down all our enemies Bring them to their knees We can bomb the world to pieces But we can't bomb it into peace Whoa we may even find a solution To hunger and disease We can bomb the world to pieces But we can't bomb it into peace Violence brings one thing More more of the same Military madness The smell of flesh and burning pain So i sing out to the masses Stand up if you're still sane! To all of us gone crazy I sing this one refrain

Painted by Hani Al-Dalla Ali
 * "Scream on Hiroshima and Nagasaki"**

**Explanation** This song represents how Kip feels about "the English" at the end of the book. He recognizes the evils of war and destruction after hearing that atomic bombs were dropped on innocent Japanese civilians. After this event, he rejects his entire career as a sapper and desires only to live peacefully among members of his own race.
 * Quotations**

"The naive Catholic images from those hillside shrines that he has seen are with him in the half-darkness, as he counts the seconds between lightning and thunder. Perhaps this villa is a similar tableau, the four of them in private movement, momentarily lit up, flung ironically against this war." (pg. 278) Kip recognizes the uniqueness of the living situation at the villa by comparing it to the landscape illuminated by lightning. As war and destruction consume the rest of the world, he, Hana, Caravaggio, and the English patient are safely united and isolated. Lighting strikes brightly, but it does so for only a brief moment. This allusion forshadows that the paradise Kip has found within the villa can only last so long and will soon be disrupted.

"The desert could not be claimed or owned—it was a piece of cloth carried by winds, never held down by stones, and given a hundred shifting names before Canterbury existed, long before battles and treaties quilted Europe and the East…. All of us, even those with European homes and children in the distance, wished to remove the clothing of our countries." <span style="color: #800000; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;">This quote illustrates Almasy's attraction to the Cairo desert and explains how nationality and heritage are meaningless within its vast, consuming expanse. Like the desert, Almasy feels that he does not wish to be claimed or owned. He respects the desert more than any living person and values its ability to connect him to ancient times and people.

<span style="font-size: 90%; color: #008080; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;"><span style="font-size: 90%; color: #000000; font-family: 'Palatino Linotype', 'Book Antiqua', Palatino, serif;">Compiled by Lara Ujtabahi (2009)


 * Sources:**

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