Michael Ondaatje: "The Cat's Table"
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2011-12-08/michael-ondaatje-cats-table
The Booker Prize winning author of "The English Patient" discusses his latest book titled "The Cat's Table."
Guests
Michael Ondaatje
author of four previous novels, including the Booker Prize winning "The English Patient."
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Program Highlights
Michael Ondaatje is the author of "The English Patient," later made into an Academy Award winning film. Born in Sri Lanka, he traveled alone by ship to England at age 11 to live with his mother who he hadn't seen in several years since his parents were divorced. This boyhood journey became the inspiration for his latest novel, "The Cat's Table."
The Origins of A Story
Ondaatje begins with a place and time period, with a very exact location, and beginning with a sense of non-fiction even in a novel. "One of the things about writing a book about a ship journey in the 1950s, especially if it's an adventure story or a war-zone adventure story, is you have to try and make it authentic in some way," he said. For him, this book does have a sense of memoir to it, right down to his decision to name the main character Michael. He put such details in, he said, to persuade readers that the events are are believable as possible.
"The Cat's Table"
The titular phrase is one that Ondaatje heard from a German publisher. The publisher said he had had a dream that he was sitting at the worst table in a banquet hall, which would typically be near the kitchen. In the book, the protagonist and his friends get exiled to the "cat's table" on the ship along with some oddball characters.
Subtext Of The Novel Is The Journey
Ondaatje had a very real sense of unawareness of where he was going on his own real journey that is mimicked in the book. "I think an 11 year-old boy is plucked out of this island where he's lived and knows very well in a conferral kind of way. And he's on a ship with complete strangers and complete - these strange customs. And he's going to land in a country where the customs are even stranger."
Favorite Writers
John Berger, an English writer, is one of Ondaatje's favorites. Berger has written several novels, "Novel G," and "Here is Where We Meet." His latest is called "Bento's Sketchbook." D.H. Lawrence is another writer Ondaatje admires, for both is style and versatility.
You can read the full transcript here.
Comments
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Dear Sirs, If possible, please let Mr. Ondaatje know that I am listening in St. Louis and I think he's absolutely brilliant. I have been a fan since hearing about him while a student in Toronto at Glendon College of York University. I have purchased and read EVERYTHING he has written. My favourites are Coming Through Slaughter and In the Skin on a Lion. Keep up the great work! from a fellow Canadian who is very proud!
Kim
had the privilege of taking a class with Mr. Ondaatje while at McGill. I have ready nearly everything he has written, and enjoyed it all!
Thanks for having Mr. Ondaatje on the show. I have enjoyed his books for years, and I treasure "In the Skin of a Lion", and "Divisadero". Both of which are like sumptuous, gourmet meals for your mind.
"Cat's Table" is truly in that catagory.
I really enjoyed your show, and regret to confess never having read Mr. Ondaatje's work -- I seem even somehow to have missed seeing the movie of "The English Patient." Now I will remedy all that!
An actor myself, I was fascinated by the author's reply, about filming "The Cat's Table," to the question put by the woman who appeared on stage in Dallas in his "The Collected Works of Billy the Kid."
If I understand correctly, the writer replied that "The Cat's Table" is two stories in one, and how would a film suit both an adult and a child audience? He had just spoken of a staged reading of excerpts from another of his books, so it just sprang to my mind (as these things do), what I think a rather satisfactory solution: make a pair of connected films to tell the movie story, or stories, of "The Cat's Table."
I look forward to my forthcoming reading, and viewing!
~~Hilary
Hilary Kacser
http://2reprises.blogspot.com/
I sailed the atacamba while the moon was in reach, and there she smirked mind wide on the beach, I felt HEPL-less... like a vegitarian leach.
The spaceship was subjective, my own culture did not seek, so I threw away my paint brush and as it impacted I did see, the continent was American...& far away I MUST breach. but as snuck sneeked the creep with conditional love the music will teach, to sail the stars to polar Mars and humanity can preach, and the Algebraic painting applies to us each. & atomic compassion normatively_navigates society To greet the unconditional sociological teet. And when the wind blows [rock a bye babies], perhaps we shall/will meet.
Yet to wait too long puts hope on the reef. Ang'd Patients in time a-mends the invisible feat. as we thread from the mast the astroNomical sheets and enter the current the capitain must beat, the rythem of destination is the crew of the fleet, even if the normal alien's mind has been exposed to freaks,,, annonymity won't leak, but god will speak.
I'm so happy to know about Michael Ondaatje's new book! I always think of him as a 'writer's writer'. He has the ability to spin the reader around so that seeing the world through his writing makes you feel as if you're seeing it for the first time. I'm a huge admirer. I also am amazed at how beautifully structured his work is. I would like to ask whether he sees the architecture of his writing before he begins - or does he see it when he's written a first draft. I think writing log fiction has a magical quality to it - and his writing is especially magical! Thank you for having him on.
Suzanne Staples
Kudos to Steve Roberts for a wonderful interview of Michael Ondaatje. Steve was so knowledgeable about Mr. Ondaatje's writing and asked questions that elicited fascinating answers. It was like dropping in on a conversation between two smart friends!