Big I, Eye, Aye.

“Some people suffer in silence louder than others.” – Morrie Brickman

In the Skin of a Lion by Michael Ondaatje follows the life of Patrick Lewis and the people who cross his path. The setting is 1920-1930. At this time, there is a great influx of immigrants. This reflects the character set of the novel, as all characters in the novel could be considered an immigrant. There is another feature which distinguishes these characters – their quietude. These characters all strive for acceptance in something – lifestyle, humanity, or country. Instead of the expected sound to accompany this struggle, it is instead punctuated by a complete auditory void. This is fitting, as the goal of acceptance is not to be silent among the din – but to add one’s voice to the chorus. Michael Ondaatje, by featuring these quiet characters – Patrick, Alice, and the Macedonians – uses silence within In the Skin of a Lion to underscore the trials of an immigrant.

Patrick Lewis may be considered the heart and soul of In the Skin of a Lion, and the epitome of silent struggle. Readers are first brought into his childhood and his silence is evident even then. Patrick Lewis as a child has a fascination with insects. It is not the all-encompassing scientific need to know about insects- which usually leads to injury to the quarry as the curiosity deepens. Rather, Patrick has the romantic eye of one who truly loves whatever it is that he is studying. He identifies with these insects, and their inability to communicate in human ways. He yearns to form a bond between a silent being and a silent species.

“Patrick pulls a double-ocarina from his pocket. Outside he will not waken his father, the noise will simply drift up into the arms of soft maple. Perhaps he can haunt these creatures. Perhaps they are not mute at all, it is just a lack of range in his hearing. (When he was nine his father discovered him lying on the ground, his ear against the hard shell of cow shit inside which he could several bugs flapping and knocking.) He knows the robust calls from the small bodies of cicadas, but he wants conversation – the language of damsel flies who need something to translate their breath the way he uses the ocarina to give himself a voice, something to leap over the wall of this place.” (p10)

This picture of Patrick persists throughout the novel – a fluid, changeable person (water quote), with an obstinate inner pillar of silence. Because of this, Patrick never truly fits in one place. His is a struggle of human relations – on the grand scale of humanity as a whole, or the small scale of one-on-one contact. It is not a complete inability to form these bonds – but to create ones that are not precarious, perched on the edge of ending. He is an immigrant to humanity. Unable to assimilate, Patrick later turns to outbursts of sound. In one case, attempts to explode a water filtration plant. Another example is when he warns a cell mate in danger with song. “The men enter and Patrick in the cell opposite on the next level up watched them and all language dries up. As they raise their hands over Caravaggio, Patrick breaks into a square-dance call – “Allemande left your corners all” – screaming it absurdly as warning up into the stone darkness.” (p184) Patrick, who longs to enter the normal human relationship world, who ultimately fails and turns to overcompensated rebellion through specific (and sometimes absurd) noise. He is the silent immigrant.

Another character which reoccurs in the novel is that of Alice Gull. She is first depicted as a mute nun who partakes in an excursion onto an unfinished bridge, unsurprisingly falling off said unfinished bridge. Before, during, and after the fall she will not or cannot speak. After being saved by a bridge worker , she will not even scream, deaf to the worker’s pleading, saying, “Scream, please, [Lady,"] [...] She could not speak though her eyes glared at him bright, just staring at him. Scream, please. But she could not.” (32) This ultimately changes, as this fall triggers her to give up nun-dom (NOT RIGHT WORD). She leaves after her rescue to become an actress. Her version of silence is encapsulated in the episode of the bridge-fall. Seven nuns went to the unfinished bridge, on what surely some knew was a suicide mission. Inner-turmoil on behalf of Alice is manifested by her complete quiet. She did not make a sound, but a great change must have been taking place inwardly for her to give up the life she knew for an uncertain one. After her exchange with her savior, she tends to his broken arm before he falls asleep. The night ends with a kiss and a whispered question.

“She leaned forward earnestly and looked at him, searching out his face now. Words just on the far side of her skin, about to fall out.” (38) “The zinc was an edge of another country. She put her ear against the grey ocean of it. Its memory of a day’s glasses. The spill and the wiping cloth. Confessional. Tabula Rasa.
At the table she positioned the man comfortably, so she would not fall on his arm. What is your name? she whispered. ” (38)

Besides the 360 degree change of lifestyle, another point of interest is the name which Alice takes. Her new persona is named after the parrot in the Macedonian bar she is taken to afterwards – Alicia. Alice can be considered an immigrant to a certain lifestyle. She begins as a nameless nun, and ends up as driven, free-spirited actress. This is her break of silence – and the moment of decision, ending her struggle. Readers of In the Skin of a Lion catch only the tail end of Alice’s struggle and silence. Also, there is the choice of name. A parrot imitates the sounds of the things around it. Quite like how immigrants learn a language. Alice in actuality is an immigrant to a ‘normal’ lifestyle and changes to be a parrot – knowing that silence excludes on from a population, and that some sort of emulation is needed to belong.

Finally, the Macedonian people. These are the most literal immigrants and in ways the quietest. The Macedonians, like many other immigrant cultures of Toronto, work bakeries, tanneries, etc. – the operations that allow the city to function. They are new to the country and every aspect of it. One Macedonian character (the bridge worker who saves Alice), revels in this newness.

“As with sight, because Nicholas does not listen to most conversations around him, he assumes no one hears him.
For Nicholas language is much more difficult than what he does in space. He loves his new language, the terrible barriers of it. “‘ ‘Does she love me? – Absolutely! Do I love her? – Positively!’ ” Nicholas sings out to the forty-foot pipe he ferries across the air towards the traveller.” (43)

He is unheard and new, and does not expect anything different.

The Macedonians’ silence is not always one of their own choosing, but instead one forced upon them by the city. They are deaf to them because of a langugae barrier, or simply because they are outsiders. This obliviousness is best seen in a scene acted out by Alice Gull and other actors in an underground play.

“Laughing like a fool he was brought before the authorities, unable to speak their language. He stood there assaulted by insults. His face was frozen. The others began to pummel him but not a word emerged – just a damaged gaze in the context of those flailing arms. [...] The scene was endless. [...] The audience around him was silent. The only sounds on stage were grunts of authority. They were all waiting for the large puppet to speak, but it could say nothing. [...] It stamped a foot to try and bring out a language. [...] The figure knelt, one hand banging down on the wooden floor as if pleading for help – a terrible loudness entering the silent performance. The audience began to clap in unison with the banging hand, the high hall of waterworks echoing.” (117)

This quote pulls all the three ideas together, as Alice acts, the subject is Macedonian people, and Patrick, who is in the audience, has such a violent reaction to the scene. “Patrick was unable to move, his eyes locked upon the crouched figure, the manic hand. [...] He wanted the hall to be quiet, the figure’s terror stopped.” (117) The play paints a picture of the Macedonian trial perfectly – nothing can be heard of the immigrant, just the authorities’ vain attempts to force them to express something.Ondaatje uses this silence to underscore the ultimate challenge facing the Macedonians – that of being listened to, or merely heard.

A picture of muted agony. This is what Ondaatje paints in this novel. All three – Alice, Patrick, and the immigrants of Toronto aim to assimilate in some way. And as their challenges are distinct, their silence is individual as well. Some succeed, such as Alice, by breaking their silence to emulate. But some, such as Patrick, can never truly change and break the silence, simply due to their nature. This tableaux of muted characters has been built by Ondaatje to show the poignancy, not of the expected sound, but the lack of it. He has shown the reader that sometimes the most brutal struggle cannot be heard at all. <—- MENTION THE SORT OF SOUNDS HE USES.