Beauty from ugliness

Saturday, March 2nd., Chiltern Court, London.

Brains and imagination exist more abundantly in the heads of novelists than in the heads of other writers. This has been the state of affairs for a century and a half, and it still is. Until it is altered novelists will continue to hold the field. I see no real sign yet of any alteration, and the advent of motion pictures gives screenwriters (who are usually novelists) perhaps even more scope to develop their talents. But brains and imagination are not sufficient. The supreme challenge for the novelist, in fact the artist generally, is surely to create beauty out of ugliness. Most novels fail this test.

Which leads me to a new novel by Michael Ondaatje: "Warlight". This is the fourth or fifth novel by Ondaatje that I have read, but the first that I have formally reviewed. Each has confirmed my first impression that Ondaatje is an original talent, a writer like no other. He is of course a poet and a film-maker and these aspects of his professional life show themselves in his novel writing. First the title: warlight is the minimal lighting condition that pertains at night during a 'blackout'; the author's intention in selecting this title is presumably to alert the reader that what is being read may be unclear, and difficult to be sure of. The novel comprises a series of scenes, remembrances, self-reflections, in no particular chronological sequence. Is the narrator dreaming, inventing, elaborating, deceiving - who knows?

The narrator is the least colourful character in the novel. He is surrounded by the surreal not only in personalities but in places and situations. Several of the characters might have been imagined by Dickens had he been a user of hallucinogenic substances. We are introduced to the Pimlico Darter, the Moth, and Marsh Felon. I am myself an inventor of unlikely names for my characters and regret never having thought of Marsh Felon. There is no plot as such though we are invited to construct some sort of narrative sequence from a series of vivid scenes. That said, there is an undeniable flow to the text and the imagery is frequently resonant. Every now and then there is a remark, or observation, which causes the reader (this reader at least) to mentally take a step back. Sometimes I found myself stopping and going back for a page or so to find the line that had germinated in my subconscious; that is poerful writing.

For my money, this is not so good a novel as "The English Patient" or indeed "Anil's Ghost" but if you are the sort of reader who is able to submerge himself into Ondaatje's style and appreciate the writing for itself you will enjoy it. Does it pass the test of making beauty out of ugliness? Certainly, which is why Ondaatje is and is acknowledged to be a great writer.