Warlight - Michael Ondaatje

There is a quote attributed Michael Ondaatje, which goes as follows:

"The first sentence of every novel should be: Trust me, this will take time but there is order here, very faint, very human. Meander if you want to get to town." How true this is, especially  with respect to Ondaatje's own fiction ? Allow me to explain as I
try to share my feelings upon reading his latest novel, "Warlight", but with no 'spoilers' ( That's a promise!).




"this will take time..." Warlight cannot be rushed. No, even if you have a full day or two with just this book, you must savour - and not  rush it down.  In the case of Warlight, I knew I could probably read through the night on a Friday or a Saturday, for its beauty could make me do that. But once you start on this journey, each step of the way enriched with Ondaatje's unique style - always with the precise words, the subtle nuances which add to the taste of the reading experience - which the reader lingers on a moment longer,  she can't bring herself to put the book down, but yet cannot being herself to rush through it. It takes time, because it must take time to enjoy the beauty it holds.

"but there is order here..."  Oh! And what order ! What precise order in this jumble, this confusion, this chaos! The pieces make sense at a slow pace decided upon by Ondaatje - and the reader agrees, "oh! this is precisely when that confusion needed to be explained out", despite the puzzlement that has nagged her possibly over a hundred pages! Its the journey that makes the nagging part of the taste to be savoured. Ondaatje takes you on a meandering journey - in an old Morris car late at night across London, in a mussel boat on the Thames, in the fog, in the rain, and you are grateful to him for doing that, despite the dodgy characters, the dog breath, the hurt of the wronged kids, the cold, the drenched clothes. For this is a book in which the reader lives in, just like how  Ondaatje wanted it to be. The sheer beauty of the whole experience can make you emotional.

"very faint, very human..."  How Faint ? But oh, how human ? The only work of fiction I've read of Ondaatje before this was "The English Patient". And how human was that ? The  love story in it, started appearing through the wider fabric of a raging war scene - from Europe to the sub Saharan deserts. He pushed war to the background, despite the rich details about it that he presented. The reader came to realise a hidden  romantic tragedy arising out of the war landscape, almost as side effect. But that was the author's aim, all along.  And once that scene - that  evidence of human love for another, love of the strongest kind, for which any sacrifice is trivial, surfaces, the reader realises that it is only with the faintest of brush marks that Ondaaatje had done it. And she is ever so grateful for it. This expert trick, the art  to make the reader in to a  lateral focusing (if you will), that Ondaatje is wont to do ( he may have done it elsewhere, but this poorly read reviewer knows no better ) is present in all its glory, in Warlight too.  The genius of the author is, that this lateral view rises out of the detail of the background, the background he's been  elaborating, feeding minutely. Out of this landscape in the background rises the focused, and there can be no doubt that what the author wanted the reader to see, was the "late born" art - as late as last page of the novel, after she indulges in the full art, appreciating the full fabric of the art, the detail in all earnest and in appreciation. The Reader is wholly captivated. Here, Rose does the impossible, for love.  Which role does patriotism and bravery play here ? I cannot but agree with Rose's daughter in her stance towards her mother ( I hold back the detail to avoid 'spoilers'), however much I dislike it. Is Rose's love reciprocated ? Is there betrayal of the subtlest kind ( of which the reader would debate even when she closes the book ) ? Yet, most of this could be pure conjecture based on the fragments that Nathaniel could unearth ? How does the reader survive the book, once she realises that  cold, lonely feeling that was Rose's fate due to her conscious decisions ? And she doesn't get a reprieve - no, not from anyone! Cruel ! Beautiful !

"Meander if you want to get to town...." Digressions or what the reader initially feels as digressions, are part of Ondaatje's style. But later she realises that those weren't digressions - but meanderings - meandering which nurture the whole experience, which make the nuances stay in your mind, which make the reading experience haunt you for decades ( yes, it is more than a decade since I read "The English Patient" - it still haunts me ).

An aside; Why did Ondaatje write this book now ? Did he want to show that war didn't end for the affected ? That vengeance is in the mind of the 'wronged' ? Did he have the land he was born in, in some dark corner of his mind, as he decided on  post world war II Europe as a canvas, to portray this ?

I am impatient to read all of Ondaatje's books - yet, I cannot read them all in a rush. For just like the finest recipes are an experience to be savoured, his work I suspect is to be savoured. And savour all his work I will. If I held Dostoevsky, Naipaul, Hemingway and Forster as special writers to me, and Camus as my firm favourite all this while, Camus now has company!