Running in the Family: Kegalle (i) Summary & Analysis

Unlike Philip’s brother Aelian, who is kind and generous, Philip, Ondaatje’s paternal grandfather, is “strict” and “aloof.” Both brothers are lawyers, though Philip becomes immensely wealthy through real estate investments and retires when he is 40. He builds the family estate, Rock Hill, on a prime piece of property in the town of Kegalle. Although he loves his family, his family fears his powerful will. Philip is determined to dress and present himself like an Englishman, which his family grates against. Sometimes, on afternoon walks, he dresses in a traditional sarong and finally seems to fit “the landscape around him.” Philip dies before World War II and a massive argument erupts at his funeral about how much to pay the pallbearers, prematurely ending the ceremony. Aelian dies four years later.

Rock Hill sits mostly empty for the next decade until Mervyn returns there alone in the late 1940s. Gillian and Ondaatje spend some holidays with him. Mervyn remarries in 1950; his second wife Maureen and two new children Jennifer and Susan live at Rock Hill with him. Mervyn takes up chicken farming and separates himself from his old friends, though he suffers dipsomania and continues to drink. He stays sober for two months at a time, then binge drinks for days on end. Although he is gentle when sober, he is monstrous when drunk, and even points a rifle at Maureen and threatens to kill her if she won't give him alcohol. Mervyn eventually dies, which Maureen announces with a dispassionate note.

Ondaatje and his half-sister Susan revisit Rock Hill as adults with their own families. The once large house now seems small and overgrown. The only thing familiar is the polecat which Mervyn was fond of, since it was his only company one drunken afternoon. When Mervyn first found the polecat, he was out of alcohol, so he drank the kerosene out of the lamp instead. Ondaatje reflects, “Whatever ‘empire’ my grandfather had fought for had to all purposes disappeared.”