Introduction

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Sonja Lehmann
writes himself into the country and becomes part of its community. 33 For the
writer, crossing the boundary between fact and fiction, writing himself into the
country, as well as into his fiction, turns out to be his route to belonging.
This practice is continued repeatedly throughout the rest of the text, the most
noted example of which is a correspondence between the poem “The Cinnamon
Peeler” (RF 95-97) and a later scene in which Ondaatje’s father gives a cinnamon
peeler a ride in his car (RF 187). As the poem starts “If I were a cinnamon peeler”,
Pesch takes this to mean that “the narrator slips into the role of the cinnamon
peeler, but the context reveals that the love poem is also an attempt to become
Mervyn’s companion in conversation” (68; see also Heble, “Rumours” 199; Snelling
29). 34 Thus Ondaatje has not only written himself into the Sri Lankan landscape
again but also into his father’s past. This is further emphasized by the description
of the father sitting on the bathroom floor watching ants carrying away
page 189 of a book, which corresponds exactly to page 189 of Running in the Family
on which the scene is located (Kamboureli, “Alphabet” 90). Saul consequently
states, “By fictionalizing his family history, by filling in missing gaps, and by adding
his own voice to the versions of others, he is taking some ownership of his
past” (51).
Nevertheless, Saul assumes that the fragmented form of the narrative suggests
that Ondaatje is not really at home in Sri Lanka: “In the search for some kind of
connection or sense of belonging, Ondaatje comes up with numerous ruptures
and gaps” (53). However, she overlooks that the different and seemingly separate
parts of the text are often intricately related to one another and thereby create
some form of textual unity. This is done by the repetition of motifs which function
as bridging devices between individual and often widely separated parts of the
narrative. The cinnamon peeler has already been mentioned which links the poem
33 This writing of himself into landscape also echoes an earlier description of Ondaatje’s grandfather:
“Like some other Ondaatjes, Bampa had a weakness for pretending to be ‘English’ and, in
his starched collars and grey suits, was determined in his customs. [...] It was only in the afternoons
when, dressed in sarong and vest, he went out for walks over his property (part of a mysterious
treatment for diabetes), that he seemed to become a real part of the landscape around
him” (RF 56). As in the poem blending into landscape signals some form of ‘real’ connection
with one’s environment here (see also Leon 33-34).
34 Ray critically remarks that the poem about the cinnamon peeler constructs the “native” as static
to contrast him with the Ondaatjes’ mobility. She complains, “That this mobility, a benefit enjoyed
by voluntary exiles, is often enabled by those exploited and burdened by the current global
economy based on international trade is entirely overlooked by Ondaatje in his poem [...]” (Ray
46). I am not convinced of this, though, since the emphasis on the smell of cinnamon relates the
poem also to another scene in the book in which Ondaatje tells an anecdote about ship captains
who used to sprinkle cinnamon across the ship a few miles off the coast and to ask their passengers
to “smell Ceylon”. Shortly after this he then continues: “This island was a paradise to be
sacked. Every conceivable thing was collected and shipped back to Europe”, amongst them
“seven kinds of cinnamon” (RF 81). Ondaatje seems to be more aware of exploitative practices
than Ray gives him credit for.