Dysfunction in the family
This prose is sublime because Ondaatje's understanding of reality is fundamentally rooted in the dilemma of this novel: whether he can forgive his father for preferring destructive habits over healthy ones. The dysfunction was inherited, he notices, because there were certainly problems in his father's house too. The idea that family is easy or pretty is simply not present in the book, and yet, the four siblings work hard to honor their father in whatever way still feels authentic.
Family, honor, and duty
Mervyn is a bad husband and father, but that isn't because he has no virtues, it is because his grasp of responsibility is dubious. Without sacrificial love, why should an adult man endure agony without alcohol as a crutch? The novelist portrays the missing element to be the honorable duty one has to sacrifice for one's loved ones. Therefore, the scene where Mervyn lies about college attendance and spends his family's money for himself—that is the epitome of this theme.
Health and identity
Without understanding one's self intimately, it seems unlikely that the author of this book would say a person could be healthy. The chronic troubles of life are enough to make good people into bad people, and to corrupt character. But in the moment, it never did seem to Mervyn that he was sacrificing anything at all. In the end, the sacrifice is his literal health, his happiness, and his very life. The high stakes of human experience are well noted in this story.
Memory
Memory is a very significant theme in this novel. Ondaatje describes memories of the life and times of the Ondaatjes’ in poems, research journals, photographs, tape records, church records, the Ondaatjes’ names inscribed in church stones floor, visitor’s book, writings of D.H.Lawrence and Leonard Woolf and oral narratives of relatives. These irrefutable details grant the novel to be called as autobiography, memoir or historiographic metafictions. The prologue of the novel reveals the nightmare of his father’s memory in Michael Ondaaatje’s mind. Though the nightmare makes the author to bring out the real facts, it is only imaginary. The entire novel is built on the memories of the author’s childhood remembrance, his aunt’s and his sister’s reminiscences. The author’s recollection of how he was bathed by an Ayah called Martina in his elementary school days in the chapter ‘Kuttapitiya’. He also reminds that his Pears Soap was taken by nauseous wild boar called ‘Val Oora’. He visualizes the black wild boar’s mouth with froth of lather from the Pears Soap. Only through memories of relatives and friends author’s search for his roots in Sri Lanka have been completed. The author has used all the pieces and fragments of the story to develop a story line. The author recalls that his father used to be good besides his alcohol addiction. He has written the whole novel through the collection of memory. He applies many inceptions and records to induce them to produce history. The author’s childhood memories are revitalized with aesthetic representation. He displaces his self and home nation Sri Lanka through memories. It is known from the words of Spinks, ‘the narrative is heterogeneous’ (111). The novel has many divisions like memoirs, travelogue, autobiography, cultural history, confessional tone and experimental investigation of his family tree. Whenever a sense of loss of identity keeps affecting him, runs into research the parentage of the blood that runs through his family history.
Multiculturalism
The theme of multiculturalism is accentuated since the author presents a photographic representation of people from numerous nations. They were the Dutch, Portuguese, British and other Europeans who were admired by the beauty of the lush green surroundings of coconut trees encompassed with the crystal clear waters of the blue ocean. This memoir is a convergence of many cultures making its theme multicultural. Michael Ondaatje himself is of multicultural genealogy hailing from Tamil- Burgher Sinhalese origin and by pursuing his ancestry the author fabricates his own identity. This autobiographical novel is a journey to behold the author’s ancestral roots. Though the invaders considered Ceylon as a paradise, they were unable to bear the hot weather of Ceylon. Along with the plenty of spices, the invaders noticed poisonous plants in Ceylon. Though this island appeared as a paradise they came to loot and Ceylon was not an everlasting haven or an eternal abode. The life style of the invaders in the nineteen twenties is portrayed by the author . he exposes the multiculturalist postcolonial society of Ceylon and the life of the rich people in Ceylon those days.
