Reconstructing identities and escaping trauma in Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient
- UNCW Author/Contributor (non-UNCW co-authors, if there are any, appear on document)
- Melanie Leah Bussi (Creator)
- Institution
- The University of North Carolina Wilmington (UNCW )
- Web Site: http://library.uncw.edu/
- Advisor
- Barbara Waxman
Abstract: In my analysis of Michael Ondaatje’s The English Patient I will discuss how identity is
reconstructed among four characters who are avoiding many lost aspects of their previous lives
in an Italian villa during World War II. By using mainly the tools of postcolonial criticism and
new historicism, this thesis will focus on how the characters unsuccessfully try to escape their
names/labels, bodies, and places of origin while reconstructing identity. I argue that the novel is
mostly about resisting the Eurocentric view of the world, while that it focusing on human
relationships and human resilience. Eventually, after the bombs are dropped on Nagasaki and
Hiroshima, the English patient is assumed by the reader to die in the Italian villa.The surviving
characters Kip, Hana, and Caravaggio decide to return to the countries where they were born,
where they feel that they belong.
Reconstructing identities and escaping trauma in Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient
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Created on 1/1/2009
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Additional Information
- Publication
- Thesis
- A Thesis Submitted to the University of North Carolina at Wilmington in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement for the Degree of Masters of Arts
- Language: English
- Date: 2009
- Keywords
- Ondaatje Michael 1943- The English patient--Criticism and interpretation
- Subjects
- Ondaatje, Michael, 1943- The English patient -- Criticism and interpretation