Shalimar the Clown - Salman Rushdie

Every read a 649 page poem? No? Read Shalimar the Clown then. It really does feel as if you are reading poetry. And before you jump to any positive conclusions, a novel feeling like a poem is not a complement. But apparently magical realism is a part of Salman Rushdie’s brand of writing. Maybe it works for his fans. It didn’t for me.

The story, if I had to encapsulate it in one sentence, is about an American Ambassador in India, Maximilian Ophulus, who comes to Kashmir and has sex with a married Kashmiri girl, whose husband is obviously pissed about being screwed over and therefore goes and kills both the girl and the American Ambassador. And there’s a whole universe that is spun around this story. And you feel as if you are drifting in space in no particular direction.

While the writing through the book is quite fantastic, no doubts about that, the story telling is extremely, should I say, devoid of energy. It is so boring that you can’t even fall off to sleep. Remember those really crappy lectures you attended in college, in which you just stared at the professor like a zombie. Reading Shalimar the Clown is somewhat akin to that. Non-linear writing is one thing, but when Rushdie kept zapping through between past, present and future like a bumble-bee from flower to flower, I couldn’t help but massage my temples to ease the pain in my head. Mixing fantasy with reality is also not something that I could digest. So metallic prophets and telepathic conversations and flying tightrope walkers are something that did not belong to this book. If I wanted to read about the atrocities in Kashmir, I would read a non-fiction book about it. And what is with all the sex? The guy is obsessed with it. And even his sex doesn’t have any eroticism in it. The words through the book while beautiful, simply don’t engross a reader.

All in all, there’s only so much of good writing that you can enjoy. I read a book for it’s story. Take that out and a book becomes an unending drag; which is what happened with this book. Yes, character development is important, conveying their thoughts and emotions is important, and giving some historical background to people is important, but all that is a part of the story. And while the Kashmir story is actually depicted quite well, it loses its sense in the larger context of the book. And the book is so depressing, intentionally I suppose, that you feel too sad, and a tad frustrated, to be enthralled by the writing itself.

Or maybe I am just too lay a man to appreciate Salman Rushdie’s works… Well, I am happy with my Wodehouse’s though. And I will need to read 2 or 3 of them to get over this book.