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I wrote a rather lengthily review of this novel for my blog (about 3 400 words), so I'll try to tone it down a bit for goodreads, limiting myself to explaining the plot and the framed narrative, and then move toward the conclusion.


THE INTRODUCTION


The English Patient (the novel) opens up with two characters, set in a specific time and place. A Canadian nurse nurses a patient that is presumably English (but nothing is certain) in an abandoned Italian villa as the Second World War is coming to its end. At the time of the novel, the Germans are retrieving from the Italy, the place is packed with bombes and all the typical post-war atrocities, such as robbery and murder. However, Hana believes that the fact that the ruined state of villa, an Italian monastery turned a war hospital, works in their advantage. Nobody will suspect there are actually people living in there. So Hana, the nurse, refuses to leave as the Allies were advancing. She can’t bear to leave the burned patient, who is no shape to be moved, but she is also deadly tired of war. The Allies army tells her that her act is equal to betrayal, and even cuts the water, but she is relentless. Perhaps the fact that Hana and the English patient lived in something that is basically a ruin, once magnificent work of architecture, but now nothing more than a ruin, is a good metaphor not only for the state of their spirit, but for the state of world at that moment. Second World War was an atrocity that nobody escaped from, and that the world is still recovering from. Little by little, we get more insight into the story of Hana. Not just the background information about her, but an insight into her feelings and present mental state. The English patient, however, proves to be more elusive. Paradoxically, despite the fact that he doesn’t stop talking, revealing an abundance of information about the desert and fragments from his past, the patient remains a complete mystery. Who is he really?


THE PLOT


Soon, however, the story gets another character, although with the patient’s past being as buys as it is, perhaps it is fair to say that he and Hana were never the really alone in that house. The patient carries a ghost of a lost love, the most dangerous of ghost, and so does Hana. In this house of spirits (to borrow an expression from Isabel Allende’s writing), another tormented person arrives. As soon as he hears about Hana, Caravaggio leaves the hospital and travels to villa. Caravaggio used to be a friend of Hana’s father and it is implied that he had watched Hana grow up. Caravaggio is an Italian, but presumably he has lived in Canada for a long period of time (or else how could have he been a family friend of Hana). His motivation for finding Hana seems clear, however, he also shows an increasing interest in the English patient. Caravaggio used to be a thief, but during the war he was a spy for the allies. When Caravaggio arrives to villa, he too is a broken man. The Germans caught him spying and cut his thumbs off. His past seems a haunted place, Hana mentions his wife (and so does he) but it is never revealed what has happened to her. Caravaggio is ironic in his talks, describing himself as a common thief that during the war got the change to use his talent for some good, but it is clear that he is more complex than that. Hana, Caravaggio and the English patient all belong to different generations. Hana is the youngest, Caravaggio is older than her but not as old as the English patient. Nevertheless, they are all haunted by their pasts. Suddenly, another character sets to the scene. As Hana plays the piano, a Sikh sapper (combat engineer) enters the scene. Drawn by the sound of the piano, Kip rushes into the house, not to enjoy music but to warn them of the fact that Germans often hid bombs in pianos and clocks. Kip’s story gets interwoven with the story of other characters. He becomes their friend and spends time with them in the villa, but he is never fully a part of it, leaving often to work on deactivating bombs. From all of them, Kip is the only one that is still a part of the army and involved into war activities.


FRAMED NARRATIVE

There is a lot of digressive storytelling in this novel. As characters reveal their personal stories to others, we’re often taken back in time. Even when the novel doesn’t follow a typical framed narrative, that is, one character telling his story to another (or more of them), the novel is filled with digressions and allusions to the past. It’s not just the personal lives and histories of the English patient, Hanna, Caravaggio and Kip. All the people from their past, some living, some dead, seem a part of the story as well, a characters in their own right. Hanna, lost a father, a lover (a father of her child) and the child. Her story is at times told from the third person narrative, at times revealed through her thoughts, but sometimes it is recounted to other characters, such as Caravaggio and Kip. The English’s patient’s history is probably the busiest one, and is appropriate as he is the oldest one. It is told in a framed narrative, but with many stops. It starts with the patient recounting fragments of his personal life to Hana, but soon he recounts his past to other characters as well. It is a very chaotic narrative, but with time it starts to make more sense. Caravaggio is determined to get the story out of patient and find out who he really is. He does this to ‘save Hana� as Caravaggio thinks she is too obsessed with the patient, but also because he has a personal interest in the story and even in the patient himself, whom he starts to like. Caravaggio was stationed as Africa as well, and it seems he suspect that the English patient is not English at all. On whose side was the English patient on? On the side of the Allies or the Germans? With the help of a potent mix of morphine and alcohol, Caravaggio is determined to get the full story out of the anonymous patient. Hence, we finally found out the full life story of the patient. Within his past, there is a tragic love story. The story of his and Catherine’s love affair is very touching but what fascinated me is how real all the characters in the patient’s story feel. They are all crafted with care. One character especially caught my attention and that is Madox. Madox is an Englishman, a friend of the patient. Together they have been travelled and researched the desert for what seems like ages. Madox was a true friend to the patient, as different as they were, and I found the story of their friendship very touching. Madox who seemed such a saintly Englishman, proper in every way, carrying Anna Karenina with him, reading it like a Bible, treasuring it the way the patient treasured Herod’s history.

WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE

It’s hard to say what I don’t like, because I kind of feel I don’t have any proofs for it, in the sense that I'm not sure is it an actual novel's fault or my personal reading. For example, there were some passages in the English’s patient monologue/narrative that I found disturbing, but I’m not sure is it just my personal interpretation or something that was really there. In addition, I didn’t like the constant references to Kip’s dark skin by Hana. They felt both wrong and repetitive, as was the case with some other parts of the novel. I felt that the Kip deserved more space in the novel, and I don’t think it was right how he was sometimes played down. Besides the above mentioned ending that could have been better written, that is about it. For most part, I did really like this novel. Perhaps it is not the easiest novel to follow, but as I’m very used to this kind of writing and narrative I personally didn’t have any problems with following the plot. Still, some people might find it difficult and as I’m mentioning the novel’s possible flaws, I thought I might include that.


CONCLUSION

I would recommend this book to people that:

- enjoy postmodernist writing
- enjoy modern writing
- enjoy framed narrative
- enjoy anti-war prose
- are interested in, or writing about desert exploration and/or WW2
- are interested in, researching, or writing a paper about colonialism and race (it’s not the only subject of the novel, but Kip character is something one could write about)
- enjoy unhappy and tragic love stories
- enjoy lyrical prose
- are not dependant on a typical happy ending
- like complex characters
- enjoy psychological characterisation
- …�.want to read a damn fine novel!

* Because my original review was too long, I edited it for goodreads but you can find the full version on my blog: