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Identity and the Inhabited Past: A Thematic Literature Review of Cultural Trauma and Hybridity in Michael Ondaatje’s Fictional Worlds

DOI: 10.4236/ojml.2026.162011, PP. 150-169

Keywords: Cultural Trauma, Diasporic Memory, Hybridity, Identity, Michael Ondaatje

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Abstract:

This literature review synthesises critical scholarship on cultural trauma, hybridity, and identity across three major literary works by the contemporary Canadian author, Michael Ondaatje, namely Running in the Family (1982), The English Patient (1992), and Anil’s Ghost (2000). Drawing on the trauma theory, post-colonial studies, and hybridity frameworks, the review maps recurring analytical threads in existing research, including narrative fragmentation, diasporic memory, and the ethical representation of violence. The review identifies how scholars conceptualise Ondaatje’s fictional worlds as sites where personal and collective histories intersect through layered temporalities and spectral presences of the past. While a significant body of criticism acknowledges Ondaatje’s contribution to discussions on identity formation and cultural displacement, gaps remain, particularly in comparative cross-novel studies and in integrated approaches combining trauma theory with hybridity. This assessment evaluates these scholarly trends, highlights methodological limitations, and proposes further research directions that foreground transnational identity and the relationship between memory, history, and narrative form.

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