Opening up possibilities and creating brainstorms
Efadul Huq rushes through a mad ride of a book and likes the journey
The Moor's Last Sigh, Salman Rushdie, Vintage
Salman Rushdie, the biological son of the mystic East and the adopted son of the rational West, gives to the confused planet a brilliant family saga in his true style through The Moor's Last Sigh. So read on as I review this book in a Rushdie-ish way. It is said when Hades was heralding Rushdie he penned The Moor's Last Sigh, slipping from place to place, hiding and never appearing in public. His protagonist, Moor Zogoiby, is a lot like him spending a life in banishment from normal society. But there's a major difference as well Moor ages twice the rate of normal humans! So our Moor is now mentally in his thirties but has the body of an old man. He, not Rushdie, is writing this novel, leaf by leaf, and nailing each leaf to a different door or tree as he rushes through the woods, fleeing his final captors. Most complain that Rushdie's language is flowery and the narration is overloading if that's you then don't pick this book. To cut a long explanation short, Rushdie has done it again in the same so-called complex way. And what is that? Abundant puns, allegories, word play, allusions, Spanish-Hindi language, local dialect and so on. For example, the nailing-to-doors is a reference to Martin Luther's posting of his 'theses' on the doors of the churches, sparking the Protestant Reformation. Ambiguously, it could even be a reference to Rushdie himself, running from place to place and writing this book while his pursuers were chasing him for writing The Satanic Verses. That's the beauty of Rushdie's writings; it is open to many possibilities and definitely creates brainstorms. Sadly, there is a certain drawback in his novels. He gives his works an extra local flavour which makes it unfathomable to the person who has never been in that place. In the case of this book, it is Bombay. But I can assure you that any reader can get over with it. Just omit the words you can't comprehend! Aurora, a budding artist, takes an overlooking yet possessive attitude toward her four children, to the point that she gives them names that sound very much like 'Eeny', 'Meeny', 'Mynie', and 'Moe'. Among these, the last one is Moor, whose bigger than age physique is a matter of entertainment for his early teacher a frustrated romance. And later on, a more matured romance delights the readers where Moor is asked to kill himself by his lover by taking a pill! The novel doesn't offer conventional suspense. There are no surprises. The end of the book is previewed in the beginning. The effect is that we focus not on what happens or why but on how. This inward chase and alienating style takes you closer to the characters more than what the traditional style can do. Magic realism is how you may describe the environment but honestly, tears and laughter never leave your side in this read. Full of wit, spiralling sentences, it is a mad ride through the mind of an eccentric character. Have you fastened you seat belt yet?
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