The poetics of permeable borders: Michael Ondaatje's "English patient" as a memory novel

Michael Ondaatje's "English Patient" enjoyed fame among Russian readers and insufficient attention among Russian scholars. The article considers the postmodernist principle of permeable borders as the basis of the novel's poetics of memory. Permeable borders are analysed on the level of spatial and then temporal composition. These are then shown in their interdependence with the images of the main characters. Four characters' scenarios of self-identification are described in their relations to the past and the present. Almasy's memory scenario is proven to form the model for the whole novel's narrative. All these elements of the novel's poetics are brought together to form the model for the reader's behavior as a participant of the fictitious world.