Title: The last colonial
Description: Christopher Ondaatje is a true child of the British Empire. Born in Ceylon in 1933 and brought up on a tea plantation, he was sent as a teenager to boarding school in England. But soon after Ceylon was granted its independence in 1948, his family found themselves destitute, and the young Ondaatje left school and got a job. In 1956 he made his way to Canada with just thirteen dollars in his pocket. From this improbable beginning there followed a series of commercial triumphs until 1988 when he abruptly abandoned high finance at the peak of his career and reinvented himself as an explorer and author, focusing mainly on the colonial period.It is the curious encounters behind these often precarious adventures that make up The Last Colonial.
Subjects: Biographers, Travel, English Authors, Voyages and travels, Travel writers, Childhood and youth, Biography, Postcolonialism, Colonies, Adventure and adventurers, History, Great britain, colonies, history
Places: Sri Lanka, Canada
People: Christopher Ondaatje
Time periods: 20th century