June 19, 2009

All is Revealed


Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient ends with a letter from Hana to her stepmother. In it she mentions my hometown.


"I am sick of Europe, Clara. I want to come home. To your small cabin and pink rock in Georgian Bay. I will take a bus up to Parry Sound and from the mainland send a message over the shortwave radio out towards The Pancakes. And wait for you, wait to see the silhouette of you in a canoe coming to rescue me from this place we all entered, betraying you."




Ondaatje, Michael, The English Patient, Random House

7 comments:

Berquist said...

How lovely that your hometown is mentioned in The English Patient! It's my favourite book of all time, bar none.

Susan said...

Unaccountably, close-to-miraculously, I am still able to access Internet. And I'm so happy to have been able to see hints 1 & 2 & the reveal. Most excellent, H-Pup. After reading your mum's latest column last night (which was terrific & I left comment, hope to read the book soon), I explored a bit more. I was ready to pick-up & move. Feeling a bit like Hana, esp. here in DC, I thought: I'll go. Now. (And yes, I had a flash of, "Ondaatje mentions it...")

I hope you might have time to write more about the area & to perhaps interview your mother a bit about living there after WWII (if indeed she went straight from England to GBay, not to be intrusive. Just interested.)

Glad I had a chance to see this...

xo

Brian Miller said...

oh drat, I just read the clues...smiles. hope you are having a great time!

Ima Wizer said...

Oh my! I am SO jealous......you don't even want to KNOW my home town and I would be embarrassed to tell you!

Anonymous said...

My Dad brother and I were on our way to your hometown for a fishing weekend when our VW bus blew its engine just across the Peace Bridge. Ma came to get is in the VW beetle, we had dinner in Fort Erie and drove home. Maybe I will have to take my boys there to complete the circle !

Tess Kincaid said...

The English Patient has been on my list of must reads for far too long. I'm getting it this week!! Amazing your town was metioned in it.

English Muse said...

I loved the book, loved the movie. Now I will always think of you when i read that passage...