A look at Michael Ondaatje ahead of Sunday’s Golden Man Booker Prize
TORONTO — Twenty-five years after its release, Canadian author Michael Ondaatje’s novel “The English Patient” could net yet another honour this weekend.
The historical romance is among five finalists for Sunday’s Golden Man Booker Prize in London. The one-off honour celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Man Booker Prize, which Ondaatje won in 1992 for “The English Patient.”
The other finalists are Britain’s Hilary Mantel for “Wolf Hall”; American author George Saunders with “Lincoln in the Bardo”; “In a Free State” by Trinidad-born V.S. Naipaul; and “Moon Tiger” by Britain’s Penelope Lively.
Ondaatje, who lives in Toronto, was born in Sri Lanka, moved to England in the early 1950s and came to Canada in 1962.
After studying at the University of Toronto and Queen’s University in Kingston, Ont., Ondaatje got his start as a professor. His writing career took off with a number of poetry collections and his 1970 poetry-prose book “The Collected Works of Billy the Kid,” which earned him his first of several Governor General’s Literary Awards. Ondaatje’s debut novel, 1976’s “Coming Through Slaughter,” is a fictional account of the life of jazz musician Buddy Bolden.
Set in Italy at the end of the Second World War, “The English Patient” has four main characters, including a Canadian military nurse who tends to a badly burned man. Ondaatje became the first Canadian to win the Booker Prize for Commonwealth Literature for the novel, sharing it with British author Barry Unsworth. The novel also won a Governor General’s Literary Award and the 1996 movie adaptation won nine Oscars, including best picture.
Ondaatje has had a diverse career that’s earned him a plethora of honours, which also include the Scotiabank Giller Prize and distinction as an Officer of the Order of Canada.His latest novel is “Warlight,” which was released in May and follows two siblings separated from their parents in London in 1945.