That one book to read before you go...

The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


If a dying friend asked me 'what should I read before I go?' this would be my recommendation.

What I fell in love with, what I still love the most about the book, is the protagonist Almasy's hand written journal, scribbled among the pages of Herodotus's 'The Histories'. What a device, summing up in one small object his intensely private self, and at the same time as he passes it to his lover, the giving up of himself, his surrender to her.

And then of course, there is Oondatje's intensely cinematic writing, which to me he never really succeeded in beating in subsequent or prior works. I can't pick a single quote, but just browse here:

https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes...

So cinematic is his language that the film by the Brit Anthony Minghella was the most faithful reproduction of a loved novel that I've come across and unusually I've seen the film almost as many times as I've read the book, because now when I read the book, I see Ralph Fiennes and Kristen Scott Thomas. They've supplanted the images I may have had in my mind, so perfectly did they capture the spirit of the book.

I read it at least once a year, to remind myself that love really is all that matters and it's big, small, good, bad, sweet and brutal all at the same time.

What's YOUR 'one to read before you go'?


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