The English Patient Winner For The Booker Prize For Fiction

The English Patient: Booker Prize Winner 1992 was written by popular Canadian writer, Michael Ondaatje. The story of this poetic novel is set in an Italian Villa where four diverse and emotionally scarred people are brought together at the end of World War II. These characters include a Canadian thief called Caravaggio whose hands are damaged, a Sikh British-army sapper, a badly burnt Englishman, and his Canadian nurse, Hannah. The anonymous invalid Englishman who has been burnt beyond recognition, shares some disturbing memories about his betrayals, and suffering pain and rescue with his companions. How this emotionally affects the inmates of the villa forms the main crux of the story. The Englishman mystifies his mates, and he constantly incites them. All the characters have their own cross to bear. Be it the caring Canadian nurse who despairs of death or the Indian soldier who is in search of hidden bombs in a dangerous landscape.