Over the past three months I have immersed myself in the works of Michael Ondaatje. His words mesmerize and flow through me like no other author I have read. At turns achingly beautiful, haunting, and hallucinatory, Ondaatje's prose meanders through time and gives us real human characters - flawed, chaotic, wonderful, and true.
As of a few hours ago, I finally have a copy of The Conversations: Walter Murch and the Art of Editing Film on its way to my house. It is the culmination of a two year conversation between Walter Murch and Michael Ondaatje that began on the set of The English Patient. Amazon assures me that this book is "a mine of wonderful, surprising observations and information about editing, writing and literature, music and sound, the I-Ching, dreams, art and history."
For those of you unfamiliar with Ondaatje, I would highly recommend his work. Personally, my favorite work of prose by him is Divisadero, but I'm not sure you could go wrong with any of his stuff. His newest, Cat's Table, might be the most "accessible." And if you really want a treat, check out this conversation he had with John Berger in 2004.
Also, I have not actually seen The English Patient. Ondaatje is only a recent discovery of mine and I am not sure I want to muddy the waters quite yet by watching a film adaptation of one of his books. Has anyone seen it? Can I get some thoughts?
1 comment:
I'm a fan of Walter Murch. He's a fantastic editor. The one film he directed, Return to Oz, is one of my favorite films of my childhood. I'm ashamed to admit that I don't quite like it as much as a grumpy adult.
I've read Murch's book on editing. I think it's called In the Blink of an Eye. It's quite good.
As far as the English Patient adaptation goes, I never watched the whole movie. It didn't do much for me.
I'm not likely to read Ondaatje any time soon, but he's definitely high on my radar since you've been singing his praises.
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