Running in the Family: Blind Faith Summary & Analysis

Ondaatje reflects that at certain points in life, he feels like “the remnants from earlier generations that were destroyed,” and feels the only thing left for him to do is “write the histories.” He feels the absence of his father is a great loss, but by the time he wished to know his father as an adult, Mervyn was already dead. Ondaatje never got to know what his father thought of “love, passion, duty.” Ondaatje thinks, “I am the son you have made hazardous, who still loves you,” and feels that his own uncertainty about how to parent his children stems from his own lack of father figure.