The English Patient (Masterplots II: American Fiction Series, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Michael Ondaatje
- First Published: 1992
- Type of Plot: War
- Time of Work: World War II, 1939-1945
- Setting: Near Florence, Italy
- Principal Characters: Count Ladislaus de Almásy, Hana, David Caravaggio, Kirpal Singh, Katharine Clifton, Geoffrey Clifton
- Genres: Long fiction, War fiction
- Subjects: Europe or Europeans, World War II, Violence, Nationalism, Identity
- Locales: Florence, Italy
The Novel
In the Villa San Girolamo, Hana, Kirpal Singh, David Caravaggio, and Count Ladislaus de Almásy, the “English patient” of the novel’s title, come together at the end of World War II. Each is haunted by ghosts of the dead, and each tells stories of how he or she came to be injured physically or emotionally. In the villa, these individuals unite as a multicultural society, in retreat from battle, their community ironically shattered at the war’s end.
The Canadian Hana is exhausted from nursing the wounded and the dying, her lover has died in the war, and...
[The entire page is 2296 words long]
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