Have you ever had a feeling of having raw eggs splashed on your face? Or ever wondered why what you find boring or not worthy of note is being celebrated and talked about? This is the kind of feeling I had (and still have) when last week the Canadian author Michael Ondaatje’s novel The English Patient, was voted as the winner of the Golden Man Booker Prize. I asked myself whether there was anything wrong with me.
A few years ago, on a trip to the United States, I had bought a copy of the book based on recommendations by a friend and after also going online to read some reviews about it. However, when I delved into the book it wasn’t as promising as it had been painted. For me, a book that fails to grab in the first twenty or so pages is not worth the trouble. I struggled through this one to half of the volume and when it failed to grab me, I left it and told myself I would come back to it at a later date. I never did. Well, that was until last week when it came back on my radar for winning the Golden Man Booker Prize!
In the weeks leading up to its win, I’d scoffed when it was listed along with other novels for the grand prize. Other books on the list were In a Free State by V. S. Naipaul for the 1970s; Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively for the 1980s; Ondaatje’s was for the 1990s; Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel for the nineties; and Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders for the 2010s. Perhaps because it is the only one I’ve read out of the five on the list, I never gave it any chance based on my disappointing experience.
The judges had been saddled with the task of reading the winning titles within the assigned period and after making a choice, these were subjected to votes by the public on the Booker website. So the choice of Ondaatje was based on votes by the public! Who am I to say no? I had my say and the public had its way. The film version also won an Oscar!!
One of the judges, Kamila Shamsie, who chose Ondaatje’s book said of his choice, “The English Patient is that rare novel which gets under your skin and insists you return to it time and again, always yielding a new surprise or delight. It moves seamlessly between the epic and the intimate – one moment you’re looking at the vast sweep of the desert and the next moment watching a nurse place a piece of plum in a patient’s mouth. That movement is mirrored in the way your thoughts, while reading it, move between large themes – war, loyalty, love – to tiny shifts in the relationships between characters. It’s intricately (and rewardingly) structured, beautifully written, with great humanity written into every page. Ondaatje’s imagination acknowledges no borders as it moves between Cairo, Italy, India, England, Canada – and between deserts and villas and bomb craters. And through all this, he makes you fall in love with his characters, live their joys and their sorrows. Few novels really deserve the praise: transformative. This one does.”
I am wondering if there’s anything wrong with my reading taste bud. That is not all, Baroness Helena Kennedy, Chair of the Booker Prize Foundation, said the novel “is a compelling work of fiction – both poetic and philosophical – and is a worthy winner of the Golden Man Booker. As we celebrate the prize’s 50th anniversary, it’s a testament to the impact and legacy of the Man Booker Prize that all of the winning books are still in print. I’m confident that this special book, chosen by the public, will continue to stand the test of time and delight new readers for many more years to come.”
This Prize is a one-off award to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the award and according to Luke Ellis, CEO of Man Group, it was meant to “celebrate the literary brilliance that the Man Booker Prize has championed over the last five decades, and we are delighted to celebrate the important role it continues to play in inspiring literary endeavour.”
Therefore, with these words from the judges and organiser, don’t you think I should grab my copy and read it all over again? Perhaps this time around I’ll be able to find the missing nuggets and brilliance they’ve all talked about.
You can’t win all the time. See you at the other end of the page.