Michael Ondaatje "The English Patient"

Author: Michael Ondaatje Original title: The English Patient Genre: novel Medical theme: nurse-patient relationship, fourth-degree burns Year of first publication: 1992 (worldwide), 1997 (Poland) Description: This book won the Booker Prize and is considered one of the greatest achievements of English-language prose. As a poetic novel, it features a narrative style that is difficult to grasp, yet adds charm and mystery to the whole. It is the story of four people whose fates became intertwined near Florence at the end of World War II. The story centers on the account of Hana, a young Canadian nurse whom the war has transformed into a woman, and her patient, a man with severe burns who is dying, found in the wreckage of an unidentified plane in the Libyan desert. Hana, along with an Indian sapper and an Allied intelligence agent, try to unravel the mystery of their anonymous patient, who gradually recalls facts from his life before his plane was shot down.