Anils Ghost

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Anils Ghost

• I. Mediascapes Spatial Narrative2. Literary
  Prizes The Turn to Art

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• 1. Mediascapes Spatial Narrative
• What larger conclusions can we draw about the
  significance of the soundscapes and filmscapes in
  Anils Ghost?
  
• The process of tracking down the film and music
  references helps us understand how Ondaatje tries
  to respatialise how we read, how we know, how we
  do history.
• How do these mediascapes respatialise the way we
  read, and concomitantly the way we know and the
  way we understand the past?
  
• Subtexts
• Alternative Spaces (Heterotopias)
• Archaeology of sound and film

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1. Mediascapes Spatial Narrative

• Archaeology of Sound Film
• earphones (59)
• radio dial (147)walkman, earphones, wires (146,
  169, 181,
  
• active jukebox (150)
• gramophone (167)
• phone (62)
• cell phone (180-81)Sri Lankan movie theatres
  (237)
  
• See Michel Foucault, The Archaeology of
  Knowledge
  

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2. Literary Prizes The Turn to Art

• Reviews
• Though it falls apart structurally at the end,
  dissipating its energy as it fragments, this is
  still better (and more important) reading than
  much of what is out there. Library Journal May
  15 2000
• More effective than documentary, Ondaatjes
  novel satisfies one of the most exalted purposes
  of fiction to illuminate the human condition
  through pity and terror. It may well be the
  capstone of his career. Publishers Weekly March
  20, 2000
• The reader becomes lost in thickets of
  speculation and reverie. Impressive and often
  fascinating, but not a success. Theres ample
  evidence that Ondaatje worked diligently, and
  perhaps for several years on Anils Ghost. But
  he doesnt seem to have finished it. Kirkus
  Reviews March 15, 2000

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2. Literary Prizes The Turn to Art

• Prizes
• Governor Generals Award (2000) 15, 000CA
• The winning artists are worthy representatives
  of Canadian literature, which is internationally
  respected and constantly developing.
  
• Giller Prize (2000) 25, 000CA
• Prix Medicis (2000)
• Kiriyama Pacific Rim Book Prize (2000) 15, 000
  US
  
• Annual award to recognise books that promote
  greater understanding among people of the Pacific
  Rim
  

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2. Literary Prizes The Turn to Art

• Why did the novel attract the attention of the
  literati? Is it because it turns to art for its
  resolution?
  
• With one image in particular, the novel
  establishes how it turns to art as a resolution
  to Sri Lankas political past and present.
  
• The Metonymic Chain of Heads
• Sailors HeadBeheadingsTortured FaceHead of
  StateIconic Statue

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Sailors Head
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The Beheadings

• She is about ten yards from the bridge when she
  sees the heads of the two students on stakes, on
  either side of the bridge, facing each other.
  . . . She sees two more heads on the far side
  of the bridge and can tell even from here that
  she recognizes one of them (Ondaatje 174-175).

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Saraths Face

• He had seen cases where every tooth had been
  removed, the nose cut apart, the eyes humiliated
  with liquids, the ears entered. He had been, as
  he ran down the hospital hallway, more frightened
  of seeing his brothers face. It was the face
  they went for in some cases. They could in their
  hideous skills sniff out vanity. But they had
  not touched Saraths face (289-290).
• Routine torture methods outlined in the report
  include near-suffocation by either "dry
  submarino" -- pulling a shopping bag containing
  chillies and/or petrol over the head and tying it
  to the base of the neck, or "wet submarino" --
  lowering someone into a water tub or well. Many
  detainees report being beaten with cricket bats,
  PVC pipes filled with sand or concrete, being
  burnt with lighted cigarettes and given electric
  shock treatment. Extreme forms of torture include
  burning with melted polythene, drilling into
  feet, inserting nails into feet or other parts of
  the body and rape of female detainees. Amnesty
  International report on Sri LankaJune 1, 1999

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Saraths Face

• The Pieta
• He was leaning over the body, beginning to
  dress its wounds, and the horizontal afternoon
  light held the two of them in a wide spoke. .
  . . But this was a pieta between brothers
  (289)
• Cf. And privately . . . Sarath would, he
  knew, also give his life for the rock carving
  from another century of the woman bending over
  her child. He remembered how they had stood
  before it in the flickering light, Palipanas arm
  following the line of the mothers back bowed in
  affection or grief (157).

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Head of State

President Katugala (Premadasa)Killed by Tamil
Tigers in 1993The cutting action of the
explosion shredded Katugala to pieces (Ondaatje
294).
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The Buddha Statue

• The statue buckled and the torso leapt towards
  the earth and the great expressive face of the
  Buddha fell forward and smashed into the ground
  (300).
• During the months of assembly, Ananda had spent
  most of his time on the head. He and two others
  used a system of fusing rock. Up close the face
  looked quilted. They had planned to homogenize
  the stone, blend the face into a unit, but when
  he saw it this way Ananda decided to leave it as
  it was. He worked instead on the composure and
  qualities of the face (302).

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I hope Anils Ghost is seen as a communal book,
in a time when there seems to be little chance of
a solution to the acts of violence, on all sides.
Pacifism, reconciliation, forgiveness are easily
mocked and dismissed words. But only those
principles will save us. Ondaatje, GG
Acceptance Speech, 2000.