The Collected Works of Billy the Kid

by: Michael Ondaatje

Published by: Vintage Books International

Reviewed by Cindy Loven

The Collected Works of Billy the Kid is a book that I just did not “get.” I didn’t understand it at all. It rambled, jumping around in the life of William Bonney, known as Bill the Kid.

I think that author Michael Ondaatje’s purpose was to create a book that he thought would make Billy the Kid seem more real to people. I think that, but because I didn’t really understand the book so perhaps not.

The poetry in the book had some erotic undertones that I didn’t enjoy, nor did I see as adding to the persona of the Kid.

It is an interesting concept, to take a bit of knowledge about a character from history and creating a character from those bits. However, as a watcher of westerns myself, and as a very literal person, I had a hard time coming to grips with the thought of Billy the Kid writing poetry or the diary like entries in this book.

As I read the Afterword by the author, I understood more that he was really trying to create a character that he had imagined all his life–as a lover of westerns. It is his interpretation of who he felt Billy the Kid was, and my literal mind just could not fathom it.

Armchair Interviews says: This author is perhaps best known for his Booker Prize-winning novel, which was adapted into an Academy-Award-winning film, The English Patient.