What’s love got to do with it?
My paper will look at the role of history, professionalism, and isolation and their effects on romance in The English Patient and Remains of the Day. The romantic relationships under consideration are those of Almasy and Katherine, Kip and Hana, and Stevens and Miss Kenton. I chose these novels for their overlapping but differing perspectives on the connections between love and war.
Almasy’s professional role and political ties in The English Patient coupled with the isolation of the desert backdrop make for an intricate and difficult romance with Katherine. Also, Kip and Hana begin and end their love story precisely because of the political conditions surrounding them. Similarly, the political and professional role of Stevens makes for stressed relations with Miss Kenton in Remains of the Day.
I will analyze these complex romantic relationships depicted in order to understand the ways in which specific characters either achieve or fail to reciprocate love. I would also like to isolate and analyze how race, politics, and the public world influence the characters’ abilities to communicate and to endure in reciprocal love. Moreover, I will argue that the love relationships within these two works developed as they did only because of the Second World War and the divisions that occurred as a result.
- Julie Mohamed
Vayshalee and Jade both commented on this post, but I accidentally deleted them. I can’t figure out how to revive them! SORRY! I read them both, though, and they’re much appreciated.
-julie
Great ideas, Julie!
I agree with your observation that war serves as the catalyst (in perpetuating and ending the relationships), but allows the growth of romance only through its removal. I think it could be interesting to, beyond looking at the extent of the romantic relationships, consider their status after the prospect of love or romance has faded. For instance, how does the distance affect Kip and Hana once they’re separated? And how does Stevens’ journey to close that distance affect his relationship with Ms. Kenton? Is that distance (from each other, and from the outside world) necessary to ‘make the heart grow fonder’?
This sounds like a rich topic that you could take in a lot of different directions. The English Patient concerns itself again and again with the question of whether true intimacy with another person can ever be realized. Kip and Hana, Almasy and Katherine attempt to become closer to one another and gain understanding of one another through the act of exploring each other’s bodies. Ondaatje sets up a yearning for real intimacy, then limits its realization (I’m thinking of the simile we discussed in class of two people being as close as “two pages of a closed book.” Also, see pg. 219 for an interesting discussion of Kip’s understanding of Hana’s body). It would be interesting to examine this form of limited intimacy in the context of the desert, World War II, and the political issues that contextualize The English Patient.
- Sophie