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In Michael Ondaatje’s The English Patient, the lives of several characters, particularly Hana (a Canadian nurse), Count Laszlo de Almasy (the English patient), Kip (a Sikh bomb dismanteler), and Caravaggio (a thief by profession) are shaped by their involvement in World War II (Italy 1944), and act as a catalyst for the relationships that develop between them. The theme of love and war is quite strong throughout the novel and this is used to help mould the characters and present their connection to each other. The novel actually contains two love stories - the sacred and the profane: one in the desperation of Italy at the end of World War II as Hana’s devotion to the English patient reflects on a pure and worthy kind of love. Their story is even reinforced by their existence in a ruined palazzo surrounded by books and a nearby medieval village. The other in the decadent cauldron of 1930's Cairo where everything is profane, and yet the love story that sprouts up between Katherine and Almasy is irresistible - and it draws us into its tale of desire and destruction. The two love stories intersect in the body of the “English patient”. The reader is faced with many questions that are influential towards it’s themes. How