Report - Book Report/Review Example

Insert Introduction Michael Ondaatje has written a novel where he tells a story about himself. The novel has been set aboardwhich is travelling in the Indian ocean coming from Ceylon to London. The cat’s table is the table which is set away the furthest from the captain’s table. This is a place which is least privileged. The people who use the table are the small boys, unpaid employees and the other outcasts. There are several characters that influence and shape the life of the narrator who is a small boy, named Mynah.

One of them is Miss Lasqueti who has been of great influence in the boy’s life. With encouragements from the adult at the cat’s table, the narrator and other boy’s at the cat’s table learn things like how to disrupt and penetrate the boat’s class of power, which is well defined. These boys learn how to interpret the signs that hinder access to invitations to go in. At this point, Miss Lasqueti gives the advice to the boys that they should keep their ears and eyes open. The boys listen to what she advices them.

And at some point they resolve to stop at nothing until they get to use the captain’s toilet (Ondaatje, 126).When the narrator sits at a table and has tea with Lasqueti, he realizes that she is not what she appears to be. During a great part of the journey, Michael had concluded that she is boring and simple. He and his friends had taken notice of her due to her noticeable infatuations with Mr. Mazappa. Nevertheless, there occur a number of events that proves their initial thoughts to be wrong.

It is from this time that the narrator starts to discover the complex character of Lasqueti by his discovery of the sacred Mannequin. It was not clear to the narrator what the Mannequin represents until several years later (Ondaatje, 178). This happens after receiving a letter from Miss Lasqueti, which was meant for Emily. In the process of reading the letter and the story attached, Michael discovers that, on that morning he came down for tea, the confrontation that went on was meant for Emily and not for him.

This is something that he did not know then. At some instance, Miss Lasquiti narrates a story of her working for a curator. The curator changed the corner of the drapery and clarified that, that is where power is and that many women had worked there for many years. The women had fought to work there as the thing fed them, and that is where the true sentiment of the table lied (Ondaatje, 221). However, Miss Lasquenti was suspicious of the analysis of the curator. She states that, that is the type of power that is brought by money.

It allows them easy wisdom. She then explains that such individuals block ones opportunities. She them warns the boys that they must not enter such code rooms (Ondaatje, 223). Conclusion All this that the narrator learns in the journey have effects on his life. Later, he becomes a famous writer and he does not sit at the cat’s table any longer. This is an indication that he took the lessons he learnt seriously by the time he got to his destination and applied them in life (Ondaatje, 263).Work CitedOndaatje, Michael.

The Cats Table. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2011. Print.