![]() Born in Sri Lanka, Ondaatje was raised mostly in England. ![]() Ondaatje’s penchant for narrative driven by time, place, and circumstance may well be informed by his own childhood, which was shaped by his parents’ divorce, his Tamil, Dutch, and English heritage, and his ocean crossings in search of family and home. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer ![]() ![]() The people in the books “move forward,” said Ondaatje, “… but keep looking back.” Before the event begins, James Wood (from center), Claire Messud, and Michael Ondaatje gather their thoughts in the Memorial Church pews. In his opening remarks at Writers Speak at Memorial Church, Homi Bhabha noted that many of Michael Ondaatje’s stories explore “the persistent ghost of childhood … that earlier place to which we all belong, for better or for worse, for the rest of our lives.”Īs he took to the dais, Ondaatje looked at Bhabha, director of Harvard’s Mahindra Humanities Center, and said, “You read my mind.” The novelist then shared passages from three of his books: “In the Skin of a Lion,” “The Cat’s Table,” and “Divisadero.” Each excerpt contained vivid scenes viewed through the eyes of a child that were then recalled by the same character years later. ![]()
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