I think what is clutch to Ondaatje's story is that Lalla married into insanity and took it as her own, became a Dickman. Her love affairs all seem to be acts of becoming as is her relationship with Catholicism. "Shortly after Willie began the dairy he fell seriously ill. Lalla, unable to cope, would run into the neighbours' homes, pound on their beds, and promise to become a catholic if Willie recovered." (158) Her promises (or should I say her lies) are also dormant acts of becoming that act as gestures signifying what she would become if she could ever get past herself. Her knowledge of becoming is limited to the costume she wears to play a role, which leaves her at the end trying to make a spectacle of her death in order to become in death what she couldn't become in life. Haha. I just got it.
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