CHRISTOPHER ONDAATJE'S SEVEN WONDERS

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CHRISTOPHER ONDAATJE'S SEVEN WONDERS

The funder of the Ondaatje prize, awarded to the book that best evokes a spirit of place, picks the highlights of his well-travelled world ...

From INTELLIGENT LIFE magazine, January/February 2012

After growing up in Ceylon and England, Christopher Ondaatje moved to Toronto and flourished as a stockbroker. He branched out into publishing, exploring and writing, and represented Canada in the Winter Olympics in the bobsleigh. He now funds the Ondaatje prize, awarded by the Royal Society of Literature to the book that best evokes the spirit of a place.

VIEW Uluru, Australia

Nothing is as wonderful as the first sighting of the magnificent red mass of Uluru, or Ayers Rock, in the middle of the outback. It’s higher than the Eiffel Tower or the Chrysler Building, measures over five miles around, and extends a mile and a half down into the ground—only a third of it is visible. You can walk to the top, which takes about two hours, but I didn’t do it because I was with some Aboriginal guides and they didn’t want me to because of the songlines. They believe it’s a sacred rock, and made a deal that it wouldn’t be climbed by tourists—but people do climb it. I spent several hours walking around it and exploring the caves and the rock art. It is a massive, rugged structure—the Alps are feminine by comparison.

BEACH Weligama Bay, Sri Lanka

The tiny fishing village of Weligama is south of Galle on the south-east coast of Sri Lanka. A broad, semi-circular, sandy beach curves around Weligama Bay, dotted with rocky outcrops and bending coconut palms. Taprobane Island, once owned by the Count de Mauny, lies just off the beach, and you can walk across to it. When we were children we used to stay there often with our parents. At low tide we could wade across to the beach, but when the tide was high the water was above our necks and we’d have to be carried across by the servants. It was a wonderful life before we left for England in 1947. Weligama was badly hit by the tsunami, but it has recovered now and it’s beautiful and much the same as it was.

BUILDING Empire State Building, New York

The Empire State Building is the symbol of America, a cultural icon. At 1,454 feet high, including the spire, it was the tallest skyscraper in the world for over 40 years. It was designed by William F. Lamb, and opened in the depths of the Depression in May 1931. It’s a beautifully designed and solid building. I’ve been to the top many times—there are lots of fences and barbed wire to stop people jumping off, so it’s not glamorous, but down below is this amazing cityscape. After 9/11 it became again, sadly, the tallest building in New York.

JOURNEY To the source of the Nile

The person that drove me, in 1988, to stop hacking through the financial jungles of North America was the explorer Richard Burton. I’d been keeping notes about him for years. My first book was about his early life in India, then I followed his incredible journey to find the source of the Nile. He went in 1856 with John Hanning Speke. It took two and a half years and both men were ill with tropical diseases. Speke “found” Lake Victoria, which he claimed was the source of the Nile, but Burton, who had fallen out with him, had not made that part of the journey and didn’t believe he’d found the source. Speke came back to England first, and agreed not to talk about it, but in fact he released the whole story and gazumped Burton. On the day they were due to debate it in front of the Royal Geographical Society, Speke was out shooting and his gun went off and killed him. The inquest concluded, controversially, that the death was accidental. Burton’s journey is one of the great explorations of the world, and I wanted to emulate it in some way.

CITY The City of London (above)

I don’t mean Greater London, just the area within it of just over a square mile known as the City. In medieval times, it was the full extent of London. Today only 10,000 people live in it, but around 330,000 work there. I left Ceylon aged 12 and went to school in England. My family had been wealthy, but by the time I left school they were destitute, so I went into the City and slogged it out from nothing. I learnt about finance, and watched the British Empire disintegrate under my nose—the coir and the coconut, rubber and tea, dwindled to practically nothing. In 1956 [aged 23] I emigrated to Canada with $15 in my pocket. It was great: I could make mistakes and had huge freedom. The City gave me my grounding, so I have an emotional bond with it. In the 1950s it was very different: cold, smoggy, and when you blew your nose it was black. Now they’ve cleaned it up and you can breathe.

HOTEL Gritti Palace, Venice

The Gritti, set inside a 16th-century doge’s palace on the Campo Santa Maria del Giglio, is certainly the best hotel I’ve ever stayed in—I’ve been to lots of great hotels and lots of dumps, but the Gritti was everything I’d hoped for. Garbo and Hemingway liked it, too. I went there with my wife about 15 years ago and, although I’ve only been once, I’ve never got it out of my mind because it’s so romantic. It overlooks the Grand Canal, with the gondoliers below—it is Venice as I think of Venice.

WORK OF ART Chandos Portrait of Shakespeare

This is the gift that kicked off the National Portrait Gallery in London, the finest portrait gallery in the world. It was given by Lord Ellesmere in 1856, and is listed number one in the collection. No one knows who actually painted it, possibly Richard Burbage or, more probably, John Taylor; it is named after the 3rd Duke of Chandos, one of its earliest owners. There has been doubt over whether it really is of Shakespeare, but—after a three-and-a-half-year study—Tarnya Cooper of the National Portrait Gallery is convinced that it is. The engraved portrait on the title page of the First Folio shows distinct similarities to this oil painting. I collect portraits: the extraordinary thing about them is that the sitter is more important than the painter.

Interview by Rebecca Willis, associate editor of Intelligent Life

Christopher Ondaatje's book "The Last Colonial" is out now from Thames & Hudson

Picture credit: Getty