The English Patient

El Paciente Ingles nos transporta a la Segunda Guerra Mundia donde Hanna, una enfermera de origen canadiense se ancla en una fortaleza italiana para cuidar a un extraño paciente amnésico con todo el cuerpo cubierto de quemaduras. Una obra difícil de leer a instantes porque hace saltos demasiado bruscos entre las historias paralelas que se desarrollan. A su favor hay que decir que los...more

El Paciente Ingles nos transporta a la Segunda Guerra Mundia donde Hanna, una enfermera de origen canadiense se ancla en una fortaleza italiana para cuidar a un extraño paciente amnésico con todo el cuerpo cubierto de quemaduras. Una obra difícil de leer a instantes porque hace saltos demasiado bruscos entre las historias paralelas que se desarrollan. A su favor hay que decir que los personajes están muy bien creados, y nos ofrecen formas distintas de procesar un evento tan traumático como una guerra. Inteligente, pero muy zonza para mi gusto.   hide

An elegantly written novel about a nurse, a patient, a thief, and a sapper. What's a sapper, you say? A sapper is a person who defuses mines. Mines like were planted liberally during wartime by most of the European countries, and are still plated today in Afganistan and Iraq. How do the others figure into the story? Well, Hana, who is a nurse, is suffering from shell shock, overwork, and just...more

An elegantly written novel about a nurse, a patient, a thief, and a sapper. What's a sapper, you say? A sapper is a person who defuses mines. Mines like were planted liberally during wartime by most of the European countries, and are still plated today in Afganistan and Iraq. How do the others figure into the story? Well, Hana, who is a nurse, is suffering from shell shock, overwork, and just having seen too much death during her stint as a wartime nurse. She cares for the "English" patient, a man who has been badly burned, but was saved by the Bedouins in the North African desert, where he crashed his plane. The thief, Caravaggio, knows Hana from before the war, and tracks her down to the hospital where she is caring for her patient in the ruins... the last nurse, with the last patient. How the four relate to each other and who the English Patient is I'll leave up to you to discover in your reading. Ondaatje is a superb prose stylist with a exceptional talent for creating characters.   hide

Beautiful and sweeping, very different from the movie.

Well crafted & calibrated story revealed one bit at a time, & checking for response as view of what's involved in the patient's mystery & past story shuttles a weave of several characters' stories together.

Took me a little while to get into, but once I did, I fell in love with the language. Ondaatje's way of describing things is muted yet beautiful. Even though not much happens in the book itself, I found myself drawn into the dreams that wove around the characters. A good read for people who appreciate the fluidity and beauty of language and consciousness. Really marvelous, but definitely...more

Took me a little while to get into, but once I did, I fell in love with the language. Ondaatje's way of describing things is muted yet beautiful. Even though not much happens in the book itself, I found myself drawn into the dreams that wove around the characters. A good read for people who appreciate the fluidity and beauty of language and consciousness. Really marvelous, but definitely a book where you have to take time to digest every phrase.   hide

There is a kind of overwhelming intimacy in this book that is not experienced in the everyday novel. A kind of role as a peeping tom that the reader possesses, looking into the lives of those who are full of passionate ideas and who are awakened by the onslaught of war. The development of each of their characters, the way that change is both a loss and a gain. The fact that nothing is black and...more

There is a kind of overwhelming intimacy in this book that is not experienced in the everyday novel. A kind of role as a peeping tom that the reader possesses, looking into the lives of those who are full of passionate ideas and who are awakened by the onslaught of war. The development of each of their characters, the way that change is both a loss and a gain. The fact that nothing is black and white, and that we are unable to judge other's actions without first examining our own. It is easy to point to this novel and say "it is an award-winning novel". I myself am somewhat wary of novels that win hundreds of pretentious awards, receive all these pompous literary honors. This book, however, is a diamond among coal. It is romantic, not in the man-and-woman sense, but in a deeper, philosophical sense. I can still feel the desert sand in my teeth, sticking wetly to my hair as a day on the beach might leave you. This is the way that Ondaatje writes, so that the story becomes a part of you.   hide

The English Patient is a work of historical fiction set in the hills of Tuscany, Italy during the Second World War. There are multicultural displays of characters that are resident in this villa; Hana: A central character in the novel she is a young Canadian nurse serving the allies, started nursing when she was 18. She realises he cannot become emotionally attached to her patients as she...more

The English Patient is a work of historical fiction set in the hills of Tuscany, Italy during the Second World War. There are multicultural displays of characters that are resident in this villa; Hana: A central character in the novel she is a young Canadian nurse serving the allies, started nursing when she was 18. She realises he cannot become emotionally attached to her patients as she has seen so many young soldiers die in the war. She has lost everyone close to her, her father the only parent who raised her left Canada to join the war effort and died subsequently. The English patient - Almasy; A Bulgarian mapper of the desert. To Hana and the others in the villa he is featureless, after falling from a burning plane in the desert his body is burnt raw. Hana falls in love with the idea of the English patient, the thought of caring for a saint-like man. ‘Hip bones of Christ, her despairing saint.’(3) He is knowledgeable and reflective; although his body is in ruins his mind is able. He is the blank screen upon which the other characters reflect their thoughts and wishes. He strongly believes that nations are dangerous inventions. Love can transcend both time and geography. Caravaggio; A Canadian thief, whose profession is legitimised during the war, using his skills for the British. He serves as a kind of surrogate father to Hana (61). There is an important link – themic resonance’s- art versus artifice, truth versus counterfeit- Caravaggio ‘sheds light’ on the identity of the English Patient. Kip; First introduced as only a ‘Sikh’, he is an Indian man working as a ‘’sapper’’ defusing bombs for the British .His name is an oblique reference to British colonial author Rudyard Kipling – Kim. He is a dark man in a white nation, emotionally detached and aware people’s reactions wont always be positive. All of these characters you will find have their own story, within the main storyline. This novel is transcultural, nationalities’ merging together. The desert setting provides a shifting landscape that cannot be claimed or owned. Ownership is a key theme throughout this novel as is identity. Nationality and identity are interconnected in the novel they function to connect the characters to certain places and times despite their best efforts to escape. The desert setting has tremendous power not only to erase identity, but also to transcend time. It is a very deep and a novel you can pick out ambiguous meanings for every sentence. It is all interlocked with many running themes. Nations, states, identity, ownership, love, time, geography and history. Herodotus is a strong influence in this writing and almost a bible for Almasy. There are many references to his writings. I would say you would have to read this novel at least twice to not miss out on all the meanings and links. It is not the easiest read for me.   hide

this was good. not as good as "in the skin of a lion", but good. ondaatje - stick with the poetic description, lose the geographical/machinery details!

I disliked the movie intensely enough to stop me from reading this book. I only picked it up because I'm on a quest to read all the Booker Prize winners, and I'm really glad that I did. It's a delicious read, with gorgeous prose, and everything set in the desert is fascinating, as is the convergence of cultures in the Italian villa, but there is a little too much convenience in the...more

I disliked the movie intensely enough to stop me from reading this book. I only picked it up because I'm on a quest to read all the Booker Prize winners, and I'm really glad that I did. It's a delicious read, with gorgeous prose, and everything set in the desert is fascinating, as is the convergence of cultures in the Italian villa, but there is a little too much convenience in the coincidences of the plot/set up, which continues to itch while reading, and one character, Caravaggio, seems entirely unnecessary. There is also the problem of the moral slipperiness of the novel; Almasy is a Nazi collaborator, even if it's for romantic reasons, and the argument that he's a man without borders (as are many of the desert explorers) seems facile. As an argument against imperialism, the book is more successful, but the English being worse than the Germans makes NO sense, as WW2 was all about Germany acting as an imperial force and setting the world on fire. I guess there was a parallel being made about England ravaging the rest of the world, and the West all being complicit, and it coming back on them when Germany was invading, but if that is the point, I'd like to see a deeper take on it - it seems mighty shallow in light of the threads of the novel and the lovely prose. Having said all that, I wish the novel was longer; I was thoroughly enthralled.   hide