My flash fiction story "In the Ruins of Shambhala" has appeared on 600 Second Saga.
Tag: Michael Ondaatje
Are there Canadian Dragons?
Are there Canadian dragons? And if there are, what are they like? Canada is far too young a country to have ever had a population that naively believed in dragons of the European variety. By the time Europeans settled the land, dragons were known to be myths, creatures of the imagination. Besides, leathery wings and …
The Almásy Controversy: History, Fantasy, and The English Patient
The following is an update of an essay I submitted to a class on Michael Ondaatje taught by Prof. Robert Lecker at McGill. The English Patient, especially after it was transformed into a movie, ignited a controversy about historical representation. Was it ethical to rewrite the death of marginal desert explorer László Almásy by having …
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Joseph Boyden on his Identity and Origins
Monday at the D.B. Clarke Theatre in the Hall Building on Concordia University campus, Joseph Boyden talked about his identity and origins--both as a writer and a man of mixed Irish-Ojibwe blood. He was accompanied by renowned conversationalist Kate Sterns and Globe and Mail book reviewer Jared Bland, "Who are you?" opened Sterns, a direct …
6 Similarities between Guy Gavriel Kay and Michael Ondaatje
Embedding myself in the novels and poetry of Michael Ondaatje this semester in an MA seminar taught by Prof. Robert Lecker, I could not help but notice the similarity between the thematic/artistic concerns of the author of The English Patient and Guy Gavriel Kay. Both are great writers and both are Canadian. Upon first glance, …
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“Gecko” : a poem for Michael Ondaatje
Two weeks ago, my seminar class on Michael Ondaatje got together to put on a fantastic presentation for Professor Robert Lecker. We were reading Ondaatje's poem "Tin Roof" and instead of writing a four-page essay response, which we are supposed to do every week, Prof. Lecker told us to go do something as a group. …
“Return to Methuselah”
"Return to Methuselah," one of my short stories, is now available at Dark Fire Fiction! It's a dark fantasy of an immortal painter who has become fed up with his immortality. I came up with this story after reflecting on the classical paradox of living an immortal life. An immortal can live forever, but in …
Coming Through Slaughter by Michael Ondaatje
Before jazz became what it is today, before it was mainstream, Buddy Bolden blew his cornet in the streets of New Orleans. No recording of his music survives. A famous musician in his time, his genius and the threat of vanishing into silence tormented him. The quest Michael Ondaatje undertook in 1976 to discover the …
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