The Moor's Last Sigh.
I finally, finally finished reading "The Moor's Last Sigh." I had to abandon the book the first time around after getting 300 pages into it. I'd just started working at India Center, and between my job and incipient social life in Bombay, I had no time to devote to reading. I started re-reading it the week I fell ill, and then didn't read it again for a few days when I was in Baroda. When I resumed the book, I had to keep turning back the pages to re-acquaint myself with the typical Rushdian (Rushdiesque?) plot, choked by an abundance of sub-plots and recurring tropes of incredible complexity. As ever, the novel is a meeting ground for opposing factions; a place where the chimerical and realistic, vitriolic and loving, impudent and reverent, endearing and frightening, captivating and laborious come together and live harmoniously as equals. Having read five of his other works - three of which I've read twice - I consider myself to be fairly well-acquainted with his style. I love the way he mothers people and places, nourishing their quirkiness, healing their pain. I love his run-on sentences with their parenthetical nudges and interjectional winks, his mischevious tangents running awry like school boys cutting class, the way he weaves the seemingly loose threads of his novels into tapestries of climactic brilliance. In short,he is probably my favourite contemporary author. He is certainly my favourite South Asian author.
I have to admit, though - and it pains me to say this - that in this case, the denouement falls unsteadily on its knees, perilously close from the "flat-on-face" status. It is a common critique of his books, but it is the first time I've felt it to be true. I'm not fixated on linear plots - My God, that just reminded me of the article we had to read in Cultural Analysis on linear plots being androcentric because they're structured like male orgasms, and how women prefered non-linear plots as they better reflected their own experiences of pleasure. Yes, I know, total digression but I assure you that that is not why I have a fondness for non-linearity. No, really, I'm not nearly that interesting!
Getting back to the topic at hand - It's not like I'm huge on traditionally structured novels, but in this case, his style fails. Still, I thought the first 1/2 of the novel was nothing short of brilliant. His descriptions of the Da Gamas and Zogoibys in Cochin consists of breathtakingly beautiful prose that is shortly followed by laugh-out-loud hilarity, which in turn gives way to scathing wit. As always, his characters feel uncannily real, despite their impossible situations. He breathes life into them through their dialogues, littered with idiosyncratic gems of language. The second part of the novel is set in Bombay, and while it starts off wonderfully, it soon gets tedious.
In the spaces between Rushdie's (well-deserved, well-written) fusillades against Hindu fascism and the corruption that has engulfed Bombay, there are plots headed by characters aimlessly wandering waiting to be fully developed. Eventually they just disappear, unsure of their purpose in this novel. While Rushdie attempts to make these extras feed into some larger metaphor, I felt like they were added only because Rushdie found their names irresistably hilarious. He also seems to belabour his point through Moraes Zogoiby whose body ages at double speed, and his beautiful, promiscuous, negligent but ultimately loving mother Aurora - both obvious metaphors for the unfortunately putrid state of India. I loved the character of Raman Fielding/Mainduck, a not-even-remotely-veiled caricature of Bal Thackeray, but even the end of that sub-plot was highly disappointing. Also, despite its humour, the book is not an optimistic one. I found myself deeply disturbed by the underlying forebodings, perhaps because I am bound to Bombay like a baby to a mother's breast.
And so to make a long story not-so-short, the last 1/4th of the book felt like a visit to a well-meaning, but nagging relative's house. When I finally reached the last word, I closed the book, exhausted but underwhelmed by its resolution. That said, there are hints of genius peeking out from everywhere, but in the case of this particular novel, they seem to be shyer than usual.
I have to admit, though - and it pains me to say this - that in this case, the denouement falls unsteadily on its knees, perilously close from the "flat-on-face" status. It is a common critique of his books, but it is the first time I've felt it to be true. I'm not fixated on linear plots - My God, that just reminded me of the article we had to read in Cultural Analysis on linear plots being androcentric because they're structured like male orgasms, and how women prefered non-linear plots as they better reflected their own experiences of pleasure. Yes, I know, total digression but I assure you that that is not why I have a fondness for non-linearity. No, really, I'm not nearly that interesting!
Getting back to the topic at hand - It's not like I'm huge on traditionally structured novels, but in this case, his style fails. Still, I thought the first 1/2 of the novel was nothing short of brilliant. His descriptions of the Da Gamas and Zogoibys in Cochin consists of breathtakingly beautiful prose that is shortly followed by laugh-out-loud hilarity, which in turn gives way to scathing wit. As always, his characters feel uncannily real, despite their impossible situations. He breathes life into them through their dialogues, littered with idiosyncratic gems of language. The second part of the novel is set in Bombay, and while it starts off wonderfully, it soon gets tedious.
In the spaces between Rushdie's (well-deserved, well-written) fusillades against Hindu fascism and the corruption that has engulfed Bombay, there are plots headed by characters aimlessly wandering waiting to be fully developed. Eventually they just disappear, unsure of their purpose in this novel. While Rushdie attempts to make these extras feed into some larger metaphor, I felt like they were added only because Rushdie found their names irresistably hilarious. He also seems to belabour his point through Moraes Zogoiby whose body ages at double speed, and his beautiful, promiscuous, negligent but ultimately loving mother Aurora - both obvious metaphors for the unfortunately putrid state of India. I loved the character of Raman Fielding/Mainduck, a not-even-remotely-veiled caricature of Bal Thackeray, but even the end of that sub-plot was highly disappointing. Also, despite its humour, the book is not an optimistic one. I found myself deeply disturbed by the underlying forebodings, perhaps because I am bound to Bombay like a baby to a mother's breast.
And so to make a long story not-so-short, the last 1/4th of the book felt like a visit to a well-meaning, but nagging relative's house. When I finally reached the last word, I closed the book, exhausted but underwhelmed by its resolution. That said, there are hints of genius peeking out from everywhere, but in the case of this particular novel, they seem to be shyer than usual.
posted by Auri @ 1:27 AM
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