The Journey from the Underground to the Heavens: Michael Ondaatje’s In the Skin of a Lion

This paper proposes to explore Toronto‘s cultural heritage throughan analysis of Michael Ondaatje‘s In the Skin of a Lion. Through variousnarrative perspectives, in this novel, we are witnessing the construction of thecity and of various immigrant identities. The city‘s memory is deeplyentrenched in its constructions, in the blood and mud that make up urbanbuildings. In Ondaatje‘s world narrating the beginnings of the city, people andpolitics are imbricated in an image attempting to allow the effort of variouscharacters to preserve traces of authenticity. We will look at how the politics ofmemory shapes the identities of several characters, at the necessity ofremembering and at the passivity of forgetting. Some of the questions of thispresentation are: How does memory influence the shaping of immigrantidentities? In what ways is the creation of the city related to the destinies ofindividuals? How does Ondaatje narrativize the politics of memory and culturalheritage in his book?