Michael Ondaatje

Michael Ondaatje was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka, on September 12, 1943. He moved to England in 1954, at the age of eleven, and to Canada in 1962. He earned a BA at the University of Toronto and an MA from Queens University.

Ondaatje’s books of poetry include The Distance of a Shout (Alfred A. Knopf, 2025);The Story (House of Anansi Press, 2006); Handwriting (Bloomsbury, 1998); The Cinnamon Peeler: Selected Poems (McClelland & Stewart, 1989); There’s a Trick with a Knife I’m Learning to Do: Poems, 1963–1978 (W. W. Norton, 1979), which won the Governor General’s Award; and The Collected Works of Billy the Kid (House of Anansi Press, 1970), which also won the Governor General’s Award.

Ondaatje is also the author of a memoir, Running in the Family (W. W. Norton, 1982), and the novels Divisadero (Alfred A. Knopf, 2007); Anil’s Ghost (Alfred A. Knopf, 2000); The English Patient (Alfred A. Knopf, 1992), which shared the Booker Prize and was made into an Academy Award-winning motion picture; In The Skin of a Lion (McClelland and Stewart, 1987); and Coming Through Slaughter (House of Anansi Press, 1976). He has edited From Ink Lake: Canadian Stories (Lester & Orpen Dennys, 1990); The Faber Book of Contemporary Canadian Short Stories (Faber & Faber, 1990); The Long Poem Anthology (Coach House Press, 1979); Personal Fictions: Stories by Munro, Wiebe, Thomas, and Blaise (Oxford University Press, 1977); and The Broken Ark: A Book of Beasts (Oberon Press, 1971).

Ondaatje has taught at Glendon College, York University, since 1971. With his wife, novelist Linda Spalding, he coedits the literary journal Brick. He lives in Toronto.