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The Collected Works of Billy the Kid
 
 
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The Collected Works of Billy the Kid (Paperback)

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4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
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  Hardcover, September 30, 1974 -- $49.99 $11.94
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The Collected Works of Billy the Kid + Coming Through Slaughter + Running in the Family
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  • This item: The Collected Works of Billy the Kid by Michael Ondaatje

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Editorial Reviews

Review

'Ondaatje is a poet and even his prose moves with rhythmic, circular precision a good little book, carefully crafted, thoroughly literate' New York Times Book Review 'A compassionate and convincing portrait not only of a savage individual but of the casually brutal human wilderness in which Billy was both villain and victim Sharply conceived and brilliantly carried through' Times Literary Supplement 'Wonderful Ondaatje's language is clean and energetic, with the pop of bullets. This is literature, art' Annie Dillard 'Ondaatje's eye for detail is wonderful and he uses it poetically, with superb restraint' Larry McMurtry, author of The Last Picture Show --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.


Review

“Moving and tragic. . . . Ondaatje is a poet and even his prose moves with rhythmic circular precision.”
—The New York Times Book Review

“The Collected Works of Billy the Kid strains one’s powers of description.... Ondaatje’s eye for detail is wonderful and he uses it poetically, with superb restraint.”
—Larry McMurtry, The Washington Post Book World

“Wonderful.... Ondaatje’s language is clean and energetic, with the pop of bullets. This is literature, art.”
—Annie Dillard
See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

  • Paperback: 128 pages
  • Publisher: Vintage (March 19, 1996)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 067976786X
  • ISBN-13: 978-0679767862
  • Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.4 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 5.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.com Sales Rank: #142,252 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Ondaatje does an excellent job of western revisionism., April 29, 1998
By A Customer
Michael Ondaatje begins The Collected Works of Billy the Kid with a caption to a blank space; the picture of Billy the Kid described in the caption is not included. This notion of rewriting the Old West, one character at a time, is an important theme in the book. Billy is cast in a new revisionist light, as a poet, lover, and observer, while still maintaining the traditional exterior of a western gunslinger.
Perhaps the most telling piece of the "reinvented" Billy stems from his relationship with Angie, his prostitute-turned-girlfriend that adds a different dimension to the traditional story. Through their relationship, Billy shows a side of himself missing from the history books-a man once seen as the quintessential cowboy is dependent and vulnerable to Angie, in his words, "caught like a butterfly...in her Tuscon room."
It cannot be said, however, that the Billy the Kid in Ondaatje's work is immune to cold-blooded violence. Billy openly writes of graphic and grotesque images, but they are dealt with in such a delicate and poetic manner that Billy's detachment is forgiven. He sees a separation between business and pleasure, and killing is strictly a profession. At the same time, though, he finds a beauty in violence-even violence against himself or Angie-that reinforces his position as a true poet. Even as he removes bullets from Angie's hand after she has been shot-by bullets meant for him-Billy calls the shots "rolled pellet tongues of pigeons," a subtle metaphor for a grizzly situation. Billy is a true warrior, but he has a clear set of priorities and can put his violent world into prospective. Ondaatje implies that while accepted history may see faceless frontiersmen, nineteenth century individuals were no different from those today, and life, on an emotional level, has changed very little. By providing the normally mundane details of daily life in a poetic context, the book sheds new light on a now complete character that can reason and love in addition to shoot enemies. Billy the Kid is an intense look into such a character, and Ondaatje makes a powerful statement about the true nature of the Old West.
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17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Billy the Kid Speaks!, April 24, 2003
Michael Ondaatje's sprawling sequence of verse interspersed with poetic prose exposes the persona poem as one of poetry's surest paths to honesty. Through unsettlingly precise detail and unsentimental empathy, the character of Billy the Kid is recreated-and revisited-in all its brutality and splendor. Ondaatje's unflinching commitment to honesty yields a persona that is as vibrant and realized as possible, resulting in a series of confessions that range from disturbing to revelatory.

The image, consistently startling, graphic and discomforting, carries the speaker through the entire sequence. Whereas most imagery depends on the eye for effect, Ondaatje utilizes all five senses throughout the book. We taste wine "so fine/it was like drinking ether," we feel Pat Garret's "oiled rifle" against Maxwell's cheek and hear it fire beside his ear, "leaving a powder scar on Maxwell's face that stayed with him all his life." We smell the smoke in Garret's shirt and taste the nicotine in his mouth. At times, the stunned silence of Ondaatje's unremitting narrative conjures a hush so palpable that we can "listen to deep buried veins in our palms." It doesn't take long for The Collected Works of Billy the Kid to immerse the reader in its own unique world, accessible now only through words and photographs.

Most memorable, though, are the intensely graphic images that sprout from the page throughout the book. The chicken digging for a vein in the dying Gregory's neck, the warts in Billy the Kid's throat "breaking through veins like pieces of long glass tubing," the blood caked in Tom O'Folliard's "hair, arms, shoulders, everywhere." All these paint an unmistakable landscape of a bleak and desolate New Mexico in the 1880's, a scene so haunted that even "the sun turned into a pair of hands" and pulled out hairs from Billy the Kid's head which, we're told later, is "smaller than a rat." Not one potentially enlivening detail is overlooked; not one square inch of landscape or action escapes the reader's view.

Ondaatje's ambitious project demonstrates that the recipe for great writing is precise detail compounded by believable emotion, a recipe he follows to the letter. Ondaatje executes these two devices so effectively at times that a kind of piercing, revelatory insight emerges periodically. Magical disclosures such as the characterization of Pat Garrett as one who "became frightened of flowers because they grew so slowly he couldn't tell what they planned to do," help to fully realize both the character of Billy the Kid and the times in which he lived, and establish Ondaatje's book as perhaps one of the greatest attempts at persona poetry in the 20th century.

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9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars A real tour de force--stunning in its effect., July 11, 2000
This early (1970) "novel" by Michael Ondaatje is a collage of poetry, narrative, memoir, photography, journalism, and fiction surrounding Billy the Kid. Ondaatje poeticizes Billy's thoughts, giving us "insight" into the inner man, while, at the same time, creating a kind of suspense about the inevitable outcome. By constantly shifting the narrative focus and point of view from Billy to some of his cohorts, the women who loved them, and the "lawmen" who sought them, Ondaatje avoids the need for transitions which would normally challenge the biographer of a legend. And by allowing time to be circuitous, rather than linear, Ondaatje is able to give flesh and bone to the impressions he creates by enlisting the reader's help in "organizing" his material. In short, this is an impressionistic word-painting which gives freshness and vibrancy to an old saga of the Wild West.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars A mixed genre work that ultimately entertains
At first, reading this book was a bit disconcerting - it rambles from one genre to the next, mixing prose, poetry, and script/interview. Read more
Published 28 days ago by Mary C

4.0 out of 5 stars [...]
THE COLLECTED WORKS OF BILLY THE KID BY MICHAEL ONDAATJE: From the author of The English Patient, Michael Ondaatje, comes one of his first published works, now available in... Read more
Published 5 months ago by Alex Telander

1.0 out of 5 stars horrible
This is one of the most disgusting books I have ever been forced to read. I believe college professors can find something better to use as examples in their classes. Read more
Published 22 months ago by deepsoul13

3.0 out of 5 stars Great Book For the Non-serious BTK Fan!
The book is very fun to read, but is not for the serious Billy the Kid fans. It holds your interest well, as long as, you don't take it too serious. Read more
Published on June 27, 2006 by Jim Johnson

5.0 out of 5 stars A Postmodern Western
"The Collected Works of Billy the Kid" creates a beautiful and visceral written collage about the legendary Billy the Kid. Read more
Published on May 31, 2005 by Malka

5.0 out of 5 stars Oh, for yesteryear
There was a time, pre-English Patient, when the innovative work of Michael Ondaatje appeared assured of standing the test of time, as this slender, groundbreaking volume of... Read more
Published on July 28, 2004 by Omen Setter

4.0 out of 5 stars COULD'VE BEEN LESS PRETENTIOUS
The book is full of desultory excerpts from Billys diary: stories about certain people  acquaintances, friends, foes, cops, outlaws (like the one he was) is told, which seem... Read more
Published on June 12, 2003 by Vish Iyer

3.0 out of 5 stars When Ondaatje Wasn't Afraid to Experiment...
...there was this book: an odd assortment of newspaper clippings, dialogue, narrative, description... Read more
Published on February 16, 2001 by matthew robinson

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent!
This is by-far Ondaatje's greatest work--and ironically one of his first! Check it out to learn about this wonderful writer's roots.
Published on January 16, 2001 by Hils

5.0 out of 5 stars Strange and wonderful
This collection of prose and poetry traces William Bonney's passage across New Mexico. Some of the short passages (on average, one per page) are Billy's voice, others Pat Garrett,... Read more
Published on June 14, 2000 by Meg Brunner

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