Encyclopedia of Asian-American Literature

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as he carries Katherine to her final rest: “We are
communal histories, communal books. We are not
owned or monogamous in our taste or experi-
ence. All I desired was to walk upon such an earth
that had no maps.” Detractors have suggested that
Ondaatje’s ending seems too forced, that his alleg-
edly apolitical novel fails to represent neutrality,
and that his characters seem illusory rather than
real. Many of these objections, however, can be
traced to Ondaatje’s poetic, impressionistic style,
and his determination to use literature to interro-
gate, rather than explain, conventional history.

Bibliography
Bierman, John. The Secret Life of Laszlo Almasy: The
Real English Patient. London: Viking, 2004.

Ibarrola-Armendariz, Aitor. “Boundary Erasing: Post-

national Characterization in Michael Ondaatje’s

The English Patient.” In Tricks with a Glass: Writ-

ing Ethnicity in Canada, edited by Rocio G. Davis

and Rosalia Baena, 37–57. Amsterdam: Rodopi,

2000.

Ondaatje, Michael. The English Patient. New York:

Vintage, 1993.

———. “An Interview with Michael Ondaatje.” By

Eleanor Wachtel. Essays on Canadian Writing 53

(Summer 1994): 250–261.

J. Edward Mallot

English Patient, The 71