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O, is for Ondaatje

2 Stars

I’m going to venture out of my normal review style here, and instead do a Q & A with Hana (the, erm... MC, maybe?!)

Me: Hey Hana, what’s up with you not leaving the Italian Villa despite the fact that there are corpses and mines littered everywhere and the war has ended already?

Hana: I just don’t think "The English Patient" would survive the transfer and I love my independence here. I mean where else can I give an immobile man sponge baths, inject him with morphine AND play hopscotch in darkened hallways?

Me: *puzzled stare* Moving on: Why do you seem to have a pseudo-sexual relationship with all the men in this book, despite the fact that one is purporting to be "like an Uncle" and another is entirely bedridden??

Hana: Well, I am a woman surrounded by men, need I say more?? *shoulder shrug*

Me: Well, yeah, I kind of need more than that! But I’m not going to get any more explanation from you am I??

Hana: Nope. Just accept it.

Me: *growls* Fine. *teethgritting* What’s up with you and Kip?? He sounds really fascinating and kind, in a quiet withheld way. Don’t you think his job as a sapper is intriguing?

Hana: I just really enjoy his silence, and the way he can enter a room and take up next to no space in it. That’s why I so frequently use bird references when thinking about him. Also his skin is brown like darkness, I like it.

Me: ...okay?! So you’re saying that the most interesting part of this man who has lived in India, travelled to London and taken on an occupation that has an unimaginably high mortality rate (I mean defusing BOMBS, come ON!) is the fact that he can disappear into shadows?? This is why you became lovers?

Hana: No, he was kind of just there, I guess.

Me: Well, that’s romantic! *headdesk* What’s the story with the English Patient? Why’s he so special?

Hana: Oh, he was burned all over in a plane crash so it turned his skin dark. I like dark skin, even when it’s from life-endangering burns!

Me: What does that even... ?? And his story, don’t you want to know who he is and how he came to be here?

Hana: No, not really. My sort-of-sexually-attracted-to-me Uncle is far more interested in his story. I’ll leave them to their morphine and stories.

Me: Okay then. What is the point of this story exactly?

Hana: What do you mean "point"?? It’s about love and loss, AND it’s really erotic.

Me: *blank stare* It is?? I thought it was about pages and pages of dates and exerts from other books that never really become part of the overall story, and love affairs that aren’t hot enough to heat a baby's bathwater.

Hana: But it’s so erotic because Kip is Indian and boy-like despite being in his late twenties. Did I mention his skin is darker than mine?

Me: For god’s sake�� YES, yes you did, five hundred million times!! Okay final question: Why in the world would I give a shit about your affair or the English Patient’s affair (in hindsight)?

Hana: BECAUSE it’s roooommantiic!!

Me: I don’t buy it, I think that while this book has beautiful moments it is, overall, as bland as plain yogurt.

Hana: I don’t think you’re the type of person this book is meant to be read by.

Me: Neither do I.