13 Facts About Michael Ondaatje

Michael Ondaatje was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka, in 1943, to Major Mervyn Michael Ondaatje and Doris Gratiaen of Tamil and Burgher descent.

Michael Ondaatje emigrated to Montreal, Quebec, in 1962, studying at Bishop's College School and Bishop's University in Lennoxville, Quebec, for three years.

Michael Ondaatje attended the University of Toronto receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1965, followed by a Master of Arts from Queen's University at Kingston.

Michael Ondaatje began teaching English at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario.

In 2011 Michael Ondaatje worked with Daniel Brooks to create a play based on this novel.

In 2002, Michael Ondaatje published a non-fiction book, The Conversations: Walter Murch and the Art of Editing Film, which won special recognition at the 2003 American Cinema Editors Awards, as well as a Kraszna-Krausz Book Award for best book of the year on the moving image.

In 1988, Michael Ondaatje was made an Officer of the Order of Canada which was later upgraded to grade of Companion in 2016, the highest level of the order and two years later a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Since the 1960s, Michael Ondaatje has been a poetry editor for Toronto's Coach House Books.

Michael Ondaatje served as a founding member of the board of trustees of the Griffin Trust for Excellence in Poetry from 2000 to 2018.

Michael Ondaatje established the Gratiaen Trust in Sri Lanka that annually awards the Gratiaen Prize.

Michael Ondaatje has two children with his first wife, Canadian artist Kim Michael Ondaatje.

Michael Ondaatje's brother Sir Christopher Ondaatje is a philanthropist, businessman and author.

Michael Ondaatje's nephew David Michael Ondaatje is a film director and screenwriter, who made the 2009 film The Lodger.