This accompanying online exhibit features the work of other artists inspired by the novel, including an audio walk featuring readings by Michael Ondaatje. His act of helping her turns out to be part of the show. [2] Additionally, the structure of the novel may be described as postmodern in that Ondaatje uses the integration of different voices, images, and re-organization of time to tell these stories. In the Skin of A Lion A Novel (Book) : Ondaatje, Michael : In the Skin of a Lion is a love story and an irresistible mystery set in the turbulent, muscular new world of Toronto in the 20s and 30s. His description of the Bloor Street Viaduct and the R. C. Harris Water Treatment Plant focuses heavily on the lives of the immigrant workers that toiled day and night for years. One night, she wakes him to say that Clara Dickens has called. Patrick awakes and goes with Hana to retrieve Clara. In the Skin of a Lion focuses on two Canadian landmarks built in Toronto: Prince Edward Viaduct (commonly known as the Bloor Street Viaduct), and the R.C. In the novel, In the Skin of a Lion, the Bloor Street Viaduct, is one of the main features or landmarks within the novel. In a minor section of the novel, Patrick Lewis visits Paris, Ontario in which Ondaatje describes various parts of the town including: Broadway Street, Wheelers Needleworks, Medusa, Paris Plains, just north of the town, the Arlington hotel, and Paris Public Library. One worker in particular, Macedonian immigrant Nicholas Temelcoff, distinguishes himself by his bravery and his talent. He is accepted into the neighborhood and is invited by Kosta, a fellow dynamiter, to a gathering at the Waterworks—a place where various nationalities gather for secret political discussions and entertainment. The Importance of the Bloor Street Viaduct as a Setting in Michael Ondaatje’s In the Skin of a Lion 1176 Words | 5 Pages. The novel fictionalizes the lives of the immigrants who played a large role in the building of the city of Toronto in the early 1900s,[1] but whose contributions never became part of the city's official history. It’s a one-of-a-kind Canadian innovation—a nation-wide trail of our country’s literature, so that you can read your way across Canada. Patrick enters the plant through the water intake. The Viaduct’s historical significance plays a prominent role in musical and literary influence as well. In the Skin of a Lion Quotes and Analysis. Three years later, Clara's friend Alice unexpectedly arrives and tells Patrick that Clara's mother might know where Clara is. Angela Shackel: Audio ProducerBraden Labonte: Visuals (MO portrait and video)Rami Schandall: Website DesignPhotographs courtesy of The City of Toronto Archives. When visiting the Bookmark installation, it’s an easy walk to Book City at 348 Danforth Avenue, where you can purchase the novel. As a young man, Patrick leaves the profession that killed his father and sets out to find the vanished millionaire Ambrose Small. The exhibit is made possible by the Good Foundation Inc. Project Bookmark Canada would like to thank the Foundation for their generous support. He recognizes her as Alice Gull. They fraternize at a party for the rich, then steal a multimillion-dollar yacht from a couple they chloroform. Harris, the city's Commissioner of Public Works often visits the bridge at night. In the same paper as above, Graciela Moreira Slepoy states that “In the Skin of a Lion narrates forgotten stories of those who contributed to the building of…Toronto, particularly immigrants and marginal[ized] individuals.” In the novel, this primarily centres around two pieces of highly relevant Toronto infrastructure, the Bloor Street Viaduct (Prince Edward Viaduct) and the R.C. The book was nominated for the Governor General's Award for English Language Fiction in 1987. In the Skin of a Lion study guide contains a biography of Michael Ondaatje, literature essays, a complete e-text, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis. Prominence is given to the construction of two Toronto landmarks, the Prince Edward Viaduct, commonly known as the Bloor Street Viaduct, and the R. C. Harris Water Treatment Plant, and focuses on the lives of the immigrant workers. In the Skin of a Lion: The viaduct features prominently in Michael Ondaatje’s book about immigrant labourer. In the Skin of a Lion is the first Bookmark on Canada's literary trail. Angela Shackel: Editor & ProducerJules Lewis: WriterBraden Labonte: Prodcution Assistance & VisualsTeresa Morrow: Audio Mastering, Diane D'Aquila Michael OndaatjeTeresa MorrowJonas JacobsAdrian CvitkovicTom LewisSacha J. CookOlive D. Braden. In In the Skin of a Lion Ondaatje plays with the myth of Gilgamesh in a postmodern way, using its theme of impermanence yet abusing, turning upsidedown, splitting his actual references to the myth. Caravaggio recalls his first robbery, in the course of which he broke his ankle while retrieving a painting, so he had hidden in a mushroom factory where a young woman named Giannetta helped him recover, with whom he had escaped by dressing as a woman. The Prince Edward Viaduct System, commonly referred to as the Bloor Viaduct, is the name of a truss arch bridge system in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, connecting Bloor Street East, on the west side of the system, with Danforth Avenue on the east. Patrick rents an apartment in a Macedonian neighborhood. Ondaatje’s fictionalised re-telling of the historical events circling the construction of the Bloor Street Viaduct reveal themes of Authority & Power, Rebellion & Freedom, and Love & Loss that continues to illuminate throughout his novel In The Skin of a Lion. As a young boy in Depot Creek, Ontario, Patrick watches the loggers arrive in town in the winter, work in the mills in the other seasons, and skate on the frozen river. Patrick finds Small living in a house owned by a timber company, and Small attempts to set him on fire—once by dropping kerosene on him and then by throwing a Molotov cocktail. These issues presents itself through factual recordings of history that sheds little … This moment is the beginning of the nun's eventual transformation into the character Alice. R.C. It was first published in 1987 by McClelland and Stewart. The nun, already missing her veil, tears her habit to make him a sling. Ondaatje's later and more famous novel The English Patient is, in part, a sequel to In the Skin of a Lion, continuing the characters of Hana and Caravaggio, as well as revealing the fate of this novel's main character, Patrick Lewis. Project Bookmark Canada exists to mark our stories in our spaces, by placing fiction and poetry in the exact Canadian locations where literary scenes are set. He steals new clothes and changes his dressing. Caravaggio introduces Patrick to his wife. "Michael Ondaatje: Overview." He has a scar from an attack from which Patrick saved him by yelling out a square dance call. Patrick sets out to search for Clara. Patrick takes responsibility for Hana. Ondaatje spent many months in the archives of the City of Toronto and newspapers of the era. Patrick intends to blow up the Filtration Plant with dynamite and Caravaggio's help. The Bloor Street Viaduct.” In the Skin of a Lion, p.27. Patrick asks Hana to drive to Marmora. The piece, written by Jules Lewis, unfolds slowly like a wandering hallucination. Patrick is broken-hearted. Patrick Lewis arrives in Toronto in the 1920s and earns his living searching for a vanished millionaire and tunneling beneath Lake Ontario. The novel fictionalizes the lives of the immigrants who played a large role in the building of the city of Toronto in the early 1900s, but whose contributions never became part of the city's official history. As the truck enters the unfinished road to the half-built viaduct, the men jump down and outpace it on foot. Patrick escapes to his hotel room and is visited by Clara, who dresses his wounds and makes love to him before returning to Small. Harris … Realizing that the water supply is vulnerable to being cut off or poisoned, Harris installs guards at the Waterworks, which he built. The Bookmark was unveiled at the Bloor Street Viaduct in Toronto in 2009, by then Toronto Mayor David Miller and by author Michael Ondaatje. It is located in the epigraph as "I will let my hair grow long for your sake, I will wander through the wilderness in the skin of a lion," echoing the theme of converging voices re-telling history. Overview. Later, at a bar, he offers her brandy, compliments, and a new lease on life. The Bloor Street Viaduct was completed in October, 1918. Beginning at the Bookmark for In the Skin of a Lion, at the Northeast corner of the Bloor Street Viaduct, history and fiction are artfully assembled into a surreal dreamscape that carries the listener along from the east side of the Bloor Street Viaduct, through part of the Danforth neighbourhood and down to Riverdale Park.