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The Cat's Table

The Cat's Table

by Michael Ondaatje
CD-Audio
Publication Date: 04/10/2011

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In the early 1950s, an eleven-year-old boy in Colombo boards a ship bound for England. At mealtimes he is seated at the cat s table as far from the Captain s Table as can be with a ragtag group of insignificant adults and two other boys, Cassius and Ramadhin. As the ship makes its way across the Indian Ocean, through the Suez Canal, into the Mediterranean, the boys tumble from one adventure to another, bursting all over the place like freed mercury. But there are other diversions as well: one man talks with them about jazz and women, another opens the door to the world of literature. The narrator s elusive, beautiful cousin Emily becomes his confidante, allowing him to see himself with a distant eye for the first time, and to feel the first stirring of desire. Another Cat s Table denizen, the shadowy Miss Lasqueti, is perhaps more than what she seems. And very late every night, the boys spy on a shackled prisoner, his crime and his fate a galvanizing mystery that will haunt them forever.
As the narrative moves between the decks and holds of the ship and the boy s adult years, it tells a spellbinding story by turns poignant and electrifying about the magical, often forbidden, discoveries of childhood and a lifelong journey that begins unexpectedly with a spectacular sea voyage.

"From the Hardcover edition.""

ISBN:
9780307943712
9780307943712
Category:
Fiction & related items
Format:
CD-Audio
Publication Date:
04-10-2011
Language:
English
Publisher:
Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group
Country of origin:
United States
Dimensions (mm):
150.11x129.29x28.7mm
Weight:
0.18kg
Michael Ondaatje

Michael Ondaatje is the author of several novels, as well as a memoir, a nonfiction book on film, and several books of poetry.

Among his many Canadian and international recognitions, his novel The English Patient won the Man Booker Prize, and was adapted into a multi-award winning Oscar movie; and Anil’s Ghost won the Giller Prize, the Irish Times International Fiction Prize, and the Prix Médicis.

Born in Sri Lanka, Michael Ondaatje lives in Toronto.

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