19 pages • 38 minutes read
The Cinnamon Peeler
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Further Reading & Resources
Related Poems
“Lesbos” by Sylvia Plath (1965)
Sylvia Plath is a 20th-century American confessional poet. Like Ondaatje, she injects her speakers with elements from her real life. In “Lesbos,” featured in her posthumous collection, Ariel (1965), Plath’s speaker is a wife, and her presentation of marriage deviates from the romanticized courtship of Ondaatje’s couple. In Plath’s poem, the desire is gone, and the wife contemplates having an affair and harming her child and kittens. Like desire, cruelty is a powerful force, and Plath uses free verse to let sadism reign. Though the definition is upsetting, Plath’s wife remains defined by her husband. Her continued connection to her husband produces the speaker’s distraught state.
“[Kissing the stomach]” by Michael Ondaatje (1984)
“[Kissing the stomach]” is the penultimate untitled poem in the “Tin Roof” section of Secular Love—the section that comes before the “Skin Boat” section. As with “The Cinnamon Peeler,” the poem centers on desire and touch. Yet “[Kissing the stomach]” displays a less possessive representation of desire. The speaker says, “We've each had our stomachs / kissed by strangers” (Line 6-7). Desire opens up and includes many people—not just a husband and wife. The speaker embraces the communal notion of desire when he tells the woman, “I bless everyone / who kissed you here” (Lines 10-11). The poem also exemplifies the epistle genre, as the male speaker addresses the woman as if he’s writing her a personal letter.
“To a Sad Daughter” by Michael Ondaatje (1984)
This poem, also featured in the “Skin Boat” section of Secular Love, represents the epistle genre, with the title mimicking the beginning of a letter. Now, instead of addressing his future, the male speaker addresses his daughter. In this poem, a woman's identity doesn’t depend on a husband and his profession. There is no mention of marriage, but the speaker notes his daughter’s interest in hockey. As with the husband and wife, the father feels a close bond with his daughter, and that connection is, in its own way, dramatic and powerful.
Further Literary Resources
“Need a Little Sugar in My Bowl” by Bessie Smith (1931)
In the “Skin Boat” section of Secular Love, Ondaatje includes a poem about the early 20th-century American blues singer Bessie Smith, “Bessie Smith at Roy Thomson Hall.” In prose blocks, the speaker describes a performance by Smith. Though the speaker doesn’t mention “Need a Little Sugar in My Bowl,” the Smith song, as the title suggests, complements “The Cinnamon Peeler.” Both works use food—or spices—to create an erotic atmosphere, with Smith’s diction arguably more explicit than the words used by Ondaatje. The line, “I need a little hot dog on my roll,” has a bawdy tone that’s less apparent in Ondaatje’s poem. As a song, Smith uses repetition, repeating the title and the hot dog phrase to reinforce the erotic symbolism.
The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje (1992)
The English Patient is probably Ondaatje’s best-known work. The novel centers on World War II in Italy and four characters in an isolated Italian village: a nurse, a thief, a wounded count (the “patient”), and a military engineer from India. Like “The Cinnamon Peeler,” the novel has an erotic quality, as desire manifests between the nurse and the three male characters. Similar to “The Cinnamon Peeler,” The English Patient utilizes history, with the Cinnamon Peeler alluding to the history of colonization, and the novel grounded in the deadly global war that started in 1939 and ended in 1945. Put in conversation with "The Cinnamon Peeler," the novel also illustrates Ondaatje's emphasis on the connection between identity and occupation. In both works, the characters' jobs define them, even if their job is a thief.
Bunny by Mona Awad (2019)
Awad’s novel takes place at a pretentious, elite college. Samantha, the narrator, is there for an MFA in creative writing, and she has to deal with a group of mean girls known as the Bunnies. As the second year begins, the Bunnies invite Samantha to one of their events, a “Smut Salon,” and one of the Bunnies, Cupcake, gives a performative reading of “The Cinnamon Peeler.” She literalizes the poem by tenderly shaving a cinnamon stick. Separate from the inclusion of the poem, the novel links to “The Cinnamon Peeler” due to its emphasis on desire and possession. Instead of a man wanting to possess a woman and make her his wife, the Bunnies aim to control young men with their mishmash of passions.
Listen to Poem
Listen to the author (Ondaatje) read his poem aloud as a part of a lecture series for New York’s Hamilton College.
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By Michael Ondaatje
