Close Reading Rushdie II - 337-429

More passages for close reading. Just like before, only - remember: the emphasis here is on the language, the type of words, rhythm, voice, metaphor... In other words, the "rhetoric" or "poetics" of the passage. Try not to simply comment on "what it says." So, with that rather tedious preamble:
1. From "What chews-on-bones..." (337) to "...only a matter of time." (338). 2. "They had even begun to sleep..." (341) to "...you are badly changed." (342). 3. "Silence outside me..." (348) to "...the name of the end." (349). 4. "Capable of smelling..." (354) to "...opposite direction to me." (355). 5. From "There was a new brilliance..." (356) to "...revisited by Uncle Puffs." (356). 6. "What I could smell..." (361) to "...the spoors of whores." (362). 7. From "Once upon a time..." (366) to "'Progresshas occurred.'" (367). 8. From "The next morning..." to "...what she knew to be so." (373). 9. "Tick, tock..." (379) to "...adrift, unmanned." (380) 10. "Who died in the holy war?" (390) to "...family from the earth." (391). 11. From "Futility of statistics..." (411) to "...Ganges and the sea." (412)

Dan - Rushdie

285

            This excerpt shows the dynamic between Saleem between  Hanif and Pia. The fact that Hanif is so set on making realist cinema relects the state of Indian films. It is said that one of the only things that truly unites Indian culture is Indian cinema. It is known that realism is a genre that is not usually within the Bollywood culture. But the stubbornness of Hanif to create realistic scripts begins to bring him and Pia to poverty. This is the first time that Saleem is old enough to notice’s the disdain between Hanif and Saleem. I feel through Hanif and Pia Rushdie taking a swing at Bollywood. This can be seen especially in this excerpt where Saleem over hears Hanif and Pia arguing,

 "Scribble," she said, her hand slicing air, "Allah, don't stop me! So much talent, a person cannot go to the pot in this house without finding your genius. Are you happy husband? Are you making much money? God is good to you?" 

Eidia- Rushdie- 3.1.11

Pages 276 - 277

In this passage, there is a narrative voice employed by Saleem, who is in dialogue with his aunt; however, he is not entirely engaging in conversation with Pia Aziz, for he has transformed into an attentive listener, who in return exchanges his viewpoints with us, the readers and audiences. While describing her talents, which have been overlooked since her first success with Hanif's film, and her now banal life amongst the common folk, Pia, physically exerts a series of signals which is what Saleem is most affective by. Describing his aunt's complaints (while she claims not to complain about her current life), Saleem seems more drawn towards his sexual impulses, taking great care to describe Pia's "adorable breasts". Already, at such a young age, Saleem has begun to exert signs of his sexuality.
As Saleem continues to speak to the audience, Pia continues to engage herself in a one sided dialogue with Saleem, who expresses a minimum of responses. She is distraught by her husband's primary focus on penning scripts dealing with social cause, and exclaims how "boring-boring" they are. Ignorant of her husband's attempt to acquire a much more segued attempt from her "Public" appeals of dance and drama, Pia forgets for a bit that she is living the "ordinary" life that Hanif is scripting. She for once forgets to place herself in the same situation. Clearly, living amongst the masses, Pia is the one too proud of herself, not her husband.

Hannah-Rushdie-3/2

2. pg 274-275 "'Not the dark one...'" to "...lots of fun"

From pages 274-275, Saleem comes back from the hospital and is going to live with Hanif, Pia and Mary. When he is telling Mary to make him a light green chutney, "... green like grasshoppers!"(green = a new beginning, happiness, nature/nurture. The lighter the chutney, the more pure and innocent he wants to feel after experiencing everything that has happened so far, such as learning about his mother's infidelity). On page 275, Saleem compares himself to the Kolynos Kid that has a big grin on his face. "...squeezing crises and transformations out of a bottomless tube, extruding time on my metaphorical toothbrush..." (275). It seems that Saleem is trying to clean his slate and mind, but his hopes thin out, like toothpaste coming out of the tube, as his parents temporarily leave him with Hanif. Transformations and crises come and go in never ending cycles.

"That I was no longer a good business risk, no longer worth the investment of their love and protection?" Saleem is portrayed as an insecure little boy, as he should be at his age. Throughout the novel so far, he is seen as an older narrator at age ten because of his abilities and his powers, but this passage shows Saleem as doubtful about his future and the love of his parents. He even wants his sister to at least give him a phone call, reassuring his position as a child in his family. In order to deal with his insecurities, he decides to act like a surrogate son to Hanif and Pia, trying to reclaim his role in some sort of typical family setting. Rushdie seems to show Saleem as an ordinary boy in India, somewhat normal and worrisome. He is repetitive in Saleem's thoughts about blaming himself for making his parents disappear from his life, going on for a page about the 'what ifs' of his injury and what could have happened if it never happened.

Michael rUSHdie---------

In the passage on page 332 beginning with "Of course i nodded" rushdie narrates as eleven year old saleem  at a military dinner with his uncle the general and his son zafar. Zafar wets his pants and is chased out by the general out of shame. In the diologic sense we get an understanding of the voice of the general in his feelings towards his son and his need to find a replacement to salvage his honor, as described through his eyes. Saleem helps Zulfikar map out "the revolution" using pepperpots, salt cellars and bowls of chutney as symbolic object of soldiers and landmarks. We get a sense of the peoples view of the president in saleem admitting that at his age he was unable to pass any judgment on the corruption of the president. So in that we see the perception of both saleem as older narrator and saleem as eleven year old child, we feel the innocent excitemnet of adventure within the eleven year old saleem when his uncle wakes him up to take him to the presidents. Decribing his journey there the style of Rushdies writing and rhythm changes, and becomes a poetic portrayal of images via memory. "Black smoked windowed limousines pausing at darkened house. sentries guard the door with crossed rifles. Suddenly the writing assumes a present point in time as opposed to a past tensed tone.

Jason - Rushdie - 3/2

In the passage from Pg. 292-3 in which Saleem is becoming aware that his Midnight Children’s Conference is becoming tainted by prejudices which leak from parents into children and seem to obliterate the compassion, curiosity, and innocence a child is supposed to have. It seems to me that the irony or joke here is that kids are presumably acting with adult prejudices when it could just as easily be that prejudices are essentially child-like to begin with. In this situation adults may be portrayed here as overgrown children.

Much of the passage also focuses on Saleem as a kind of humanitarian who believes in the potential of the individual to overcome the dualities that are found throughout society. He wants to create a “third space” so to speak, outside of duality – duality being the thing that most alienates one thing/person/idea from another. Also, Saleem, in a way, shows himself to be a “dreamer,” believing in the power of ideas over the power of things. In this sense, Saleem could also be seen as a kind of spiritual figure, who rejects the material/physical/temporal world. There’s also the clear impression that the Conference, and what Saleem is arguing for, are part of a political discourse. It seems that Saleem’s position calls attention to or satirizes “the plea for reason” or “doing things for the greater good” within the context of a democracy.

Saleem’s ideas are confronted (or at least contrasted) by Shiva’s opposing beliefs in the inherent and inescapable dualities of life, that there is nothing more to living than providing for oneself, and that people are nothing more than things.

            This passage could also be a metaphor for human nature in general seen through the emerging yin and yang of Saleem’s mind as he comes of age or representative of self-confidence/self-belief versus self-doubt. This interpretation would probably be more applicable to Saleem the Narrator since his perspective is more removed and thus would be one that encompasses both sides of the argument.

Karol - Rushdie -03/02

One thing  distinct about the narrator’s voice is that his voice shift from present to past tensed narration he seems to evoke himself as if in the present by speaking to the audience familiarly. Part of the familiarity, I think, comes from the self-abasing satirical undertones Salim employs in narration. Stating his actions as allegorical or symbolic reduces them to readership but then again empowers the narrator because of his ability to suspend judgment in his following by reducing himself before they get a chance to. Rushdie beats the hand of judgment to the punch by having his protagonist declare the artifice of his constructions, an “active metaphorical mode of connection.”

                       

The pace picks up as Salim is woken up for the “real thing.” The list of objects being used for the game of strategy he is helping in set the pace as he is awoken by his uncle. His uncle also calls him “sonny.” Also, the text apologizes for Salim before it puts him in the abduction scene. “An eleven-year-old boy cannot judge whether a President is truly corrupt, even if gongs-and-pips say he is; it is not for eleven-year olds to say whether Mirza’s association with the feeble Republican Party should have disqualified him from high office under the new régime. Saleem Sinai made no political judgments…”

Rushdie sets the strange scene of the home invasion as it is happening in the present. “Black smoked-windowed limousine pausing at darkened house. Sentries guard the door with crossed rifles; which part, to let us through. I am marching at my uncle’s side, in step, through half-lit corridors; until we burst into a dark room with a shaft of moonlight spotlighting a four-poster bed. A mosquito net hangs over the bed like a shroud.” The opening of this sequence of events speaks of manhood as it pertains to fatherhood. Even though, Salim is inventing his father figures his initiation in manhood is very real and dire. (332-33)

Will - Rushdie - 3/2

On page 276, the passage that begins "My mumani . . . " starts in the voice of the narrator Saleem, describing a charming scene from his youth when his film-star aunt made him act out scenes with her.  But the image of innocence is undercut with the detail that Saleem is "trying to keep my eyes away from two impossible orbs, spherical as melons, golden as mangoes."  This is a schoolboy's way of describing breasts, similar to when Saleem described his mother's butt as a giant black mango.  The phrase captures the awkwardness of Saleem's position at that moment:  he is being treated as a child, but he is in the beginning stages of his sexual maturity.  Pia then gives a melodramatic soliloquy, with "one arm flung across her brow."  She laments her declining fame and her simple life with Hanif, and ends with the ridiculous phrase:  "But I know this:  my face is my fortune; after that, what riches do I need?"  This is the voice of an actress, declining in fame but still dignified.  Rushdie is poking fun at the melodrama and narcissism of famous people, but in that moment the reader can still admire her self-possession. 

This is not so true when at the next moment Pia switches to the voice of a nagging wife, decrying Hanif's "boring-boring scripts" which are devoid of singing, dancing, drama, or humor.  Pia's monologue ends with the hilarious line, "So you know what he is writing now?  About . . . the Ordinary Life of a Pickle-Factory!"  Hanif, the strictest realist filmmaker ever, is all the while sitting on a "chlorophyll-striped sofa."  Rushdie inserts this detail to connect him to the Kolynos Kid, the smiley child on a toothpaste billboard representing gross consumerist culture.  This allusion keeps the reader from thinking of Hanif as a martyr, and his wife as a soul-sucker.  Saleem doesn't know whose side to take, and neither does the reader.  Rushdie uses different voices to make a common type of scene bewildering (perhaps because to a young child like Saleem it is bewildering).  This scene is funny, but it's a portrait of an unhappy marriage.  It's melodramatic but also psychologically realistic.  

Joseph-Rushdie-3/2

1. p. 273, beginning "Sensing Padma's..." and ending "...passed us by." 


It's obvious in this passage that we are meeting the poetic and linguistic narrator. This narrator is one who cannot find meaning unless he covers all grounds, and this is an instance in which he must explain terms mentioned in an earlier paragraph to a "bewildered"  Padma. It's largely a paragraph that attempts to poeticize the hyphen, and link each term to an academic study of 'Midnight's Children("passive-metaphorical", "passive-literal", and "active metaphorical"). This passage seems made for Spark Notes or term papers,and it's easy to see Rushdie is having fun(at one point he says "Under this heading you should file", as if he knows we are making handy analyses in our spiral notebooks). To link it to another work that pokes fun of it's audience(Nabokov's "Pale Fire"), it would be like if John Shade had left a poem, complete with handwritten annotations and a study guide, for Charles Kinbote , instead of Kinbote explicating little on the actual text and interpreting through his own idiosyncratic and delusional lens. Saleem may be having a go at jabbing his reader with scholarly humor, but he is also deadly serious and concerned about how he is to be interpreted. He leaves no room for ambiguity, unlike the deceased poet of 'Pale Fire'.

For Saleem, his outlook is mostly "active metaphorical": He imagines his life to run parallel with India's, and he actively goes seeking for connections. If reached for long or far enough, almost any event in our own lives can be made "active metaphorical" to match with history.  Saleem attributes only one event to being "active-literal": The rallying cry he gave the people. This is of course humorous, because Saleem states earlier that the words are "A nonsense; a nothing; nine words of emptiness". The most active thing he has done was essentially unintentional. These nine words of emptiness  played a role in the partition of Bombay(although, like many other things, perhaps Saleem overstates his influence).

On a structural level, the paragraph is very passive and serves to recount many things have occurred, or in the event that Saleem is reflecting on something which is to occur. It's a long, extended paragraph that does not have the one thing the passage ultimately addresses: action. As the passage comes to an end, Saleem laments that the Midnight's Children group had "passive-literal", "passive-metaphorical", and "active-metaphorical":What they did not have was "active-literal", and in terms of the narrative, neither did this passage.

The Language Wars: analyzing Rushdie's style pp. 273-336

For this post, please analyze one of the passages below. In class, we will analyze each one: you should contribute when we get to yours. As we've established, Rushdie employs a "dialogic" style, meaning that he writes in many voices. As you look closely at the passage you've picked, try to pick out the voices: the author/narrator; the voice of the Indian people; the scientist or specialist; the poet; the historian; the ordinary or uneducated person, etc. What satirical purpose does he create through mimicry? Also, analyze his use of allusions, rhythm, tone, imagery, repetition, inside jokes - and other techniques of literary poetics. Passages: 1. p. 273, beginning "Sensing Padma's..." and ending "...passed us by." 2. 274-275 from "Not the dark one..." to "...lots of fun." 3. From "My mumani" (276) to "..Life of a Pickle-Factory" (277). 4. From "The ghost of Joe..." (280) to "..confusion you will unleash." (281). 5. From "When I returned..." (285) to "..was a terrific exit." (286). 6. From "In this way..." (292) to "...with one single thing." (293). 7. From "Who listed..." (295) to "...with the Reaper. (With my help.)" (296). 8. From "I confess: what I did..." (297) to "AFTER NEHRU, WHO?" (298). 9. From "KNOW, O UNBELIEVERS..." (306) to "...of Good Family." (307). 10. From "It was said; could not be unsaid..." (312) to "...would probably have approved." (313). 11. From "Of course, I nodded." (332) to "...over the bed like a shroud." (333).

MICHAEL Rushdie---------

rUSHDIE mentions that everything has shape if you look for it. There is no escape from form, immediately after comparing the different sources of blood. The "rioters spilling eachothers blood" the blood of "his mothers cheeks. drifting off from the subject to discuss the affairs of his "inner world" then returning to the mutilation of saleem sinai. I feel that in the line of no escape from form, rushdie is merely considering the tendency to look for patterns in chaos, and eventually finding them. in terms of style I this jump from one telling to another subject displays the non linearity of rushdies style, he jumps on tangents and allows them to loose steam in his ranting. He has so much to say in dealing with the entitiy of india that , some things are put on stand by while he explains others departments of his mental chasm. wHICH IS understandable for someone who uses his own mind as a forum for telepathic communication.

Anna –Rushdie- 2/28

I'm having some trouble figuring out what Rushdie is doing, for a book that I began reading as sheer genius, and though I still think that on a large scale it is, (and even in the tiniest of details- also brilliant) it is very difficult to string at one time, more than one theme along, for example wondering about the witchcraft brew Padma brings home for the author for his fertility that sends him into fever (the heck does that mean?) and then the Evie American with the bicycles and all the commentary on race and children (innocence but also play and violence) this brings up, to the using of famous gods with well known characteristics to be devious characters, to falling in love with the ugly bits of people. So much action and metaphor and detail, so little explanation. I latched onto one line where Rushdie said (I paraphrase) reality can have metaphorical bits but this does not make it less real. This is what I latch onto. Oh and I really like how when he falls in love with Evie its because she is both snake and ladder, of course.

Jason - Rushdie - 2/28

The further along in the book I get the more it seems the structure of it deals with the juxtaposition or superimposition of the workings of the inner mind and the workings of the everything else outside of the mind. Much of Saleem’s narrative style could be explained as having the quality of attributing the processes of his mind, which he describes as being “messy” (with ideas and ideas of things leaking into one another so that they overlap and create new meaning or meanings that otherwise wouldn’t exist), and placing those “messy” associations into the world outside of his mind.

By doing this, Saleem implicitly creates meaning in things. This is evident in almost any section of the novel where one object is associated with another. This practice of creating meaning seems to finally come into direct opposition with Shiva, the other original Midnight Child, who holds the exact opposite opinion: there is no meaning or purpose for why things are the way they are.

On Pg. 252-3, Saleem has a mental conference with Shiva, during which time Shiva essentially states that he seeks to control the M.C.C. and make it do what he wants. This seems to set the stage for an “epic battle between good and evil.” The joke might be that this encounter with Shiva, and all other M.C.C. members for that matter, are all within Saleem’s mind. If so, the story in which Saleem the character exists might just be a veneer for a debate over whether things have meaning or not.

And because Saleem seems to believe in form (by performing his duty as narrator he implicitly looks for it) that belief might be justification enough to say that meaning exists in the world (which appears to consist of a mixing of the inner mind and the outer enviorment). But because there seem to be two sets of inner-minds (that of the young Saleem the character and that of the older Saleem the narrator) and two sets of external realities (that of the family history and political history in which Saleem the character lives and that of the pickle factory and Padma in which Narrator Saleem lives) it seems difficult to attribute more truth to one set of perspectives over another. They all could be the same illusion, which might mean: that to believe in meaning and purpose is to deceive yourself.

Jane-Rushdie-2/28/2011

Throughout the narrative we find ourselves questioning Saleem as a reliable narrator and whether or not he is in fact, insane, which is why is find the opening paragraph of All- India Radio telling about Saleem's interpretation of history to be truthful. At the end of the passage when he says, "I reiterate, without a sense of shame, my unbelievable claim: after a curious accident in a washing-chest, I became a sort of radio" (Rushdie, 189) I was reminded of an earlier passage wherein several villagers find Saleem's grandfather's optimism in the face of revolt and bloodshed disconcerting: "The old men at the paan-shop at the top of Cornwallis Road chewed betel and suspected a trick. I have lived twice as long as I should have,the oldest one said, his voice cracking like an old radio because decades were rubbing up against each other around his vocal chords" (Rushdie, 38). This seems to correspond to Rushdie's metaphor of the distortion of the movie screen when seen up close to our perception of history when in the present. As another modern device, the likening of the old man to the garbled sounds of a radio being the result of decades past melding into one another speaks further Saleem comparing himself to a radio and whether then we can trust him as a reputable source of knowledge on India's past. 

Karol - Rushdie -2/28

I had an 'ah ha' moment with the song that keeps coming up how-much-is-that-doggie-in-the-window (165,298)This seems to be satirical of a concept of love at a distance. Amina is in close proximity to the first example grappling with the dream of an "unnameable" husband. In the second occurrence it lies in proximity to reference to Crusoe (emblematic for colonial literature).  In Rushdie's context I think it is making fun of the west's obsession with objectified and unreachable images from less developed parts of the world. Laika is also mentioned giving grounds to this premise because of Wests reaction to a dog being sent into space to die.

I do think that the characters are comic but I think I are something more, they are cartooned. The exaggerations of their features make them less life like and therefore more life like to interface with. Kind of a response to the "uncanny valley" that happens with excessive realism. Jonathan Swift does something like this with the his portrayals of the Irish.

Eidia- Rushdie- 2.28.11

Punishment and Atonement

Distributed via several passages, in Rushdie's novel Midnight's Children, there are several examples of the relationship between punishment and atonement, action and reaction.
There are the naive and disciplined examples of Amina's power to forbid her children from speaking, a common punishment for their misdeeds, for she cannot bring herself to raise her hands on them. The example of the wash closet, Saleem's coincidental witnessing of his mother's nudity and still intact vulnerability towards Nadir resulted in a days worth of silence. Later, the Brass Monkey awakes the next morning, eagerly urging her mother to retract the punishment, for Saleem has been good, he has not spoken since the sentence. Once allowed to speak; however, Saleem addresses the family with the news of his interaction with the archangels, leading to a powerful strike to his ears, partially deafening him. Along with Saleem's punishments, the Brass Monkey, the family's original malicious child, reputed for her shoe burning habits and fierce actions, has faced these punishments at a multiple rate.
Elevated, in a graver manner, there are the sins of the adults, and their punishments. One of the most striking and burdensome punishment is that of Mary Periera, who has been concealing her crime from the entire society: the exchanging of babies. With this act, Mary Periera inherited a sense of guilt, so prominent, that the apparitions of Joseph D'Costa reestablished several times, leaving Mary bewildered, paranoid, sleep deprived, but incapable of admitting her crime, severely heightening her already intense sense of guilt.

Hannah-Rushdie-2/28

Saleem's mother, Amina, is described as taking the "burdens of the world" upon her own back on page 180. She becomes a Christ like figure because of her loyalty to her family and community, her ever lasting guilt and most importantly, the sacrifices she goes through in order to feel rid of her "sins" (seems like being human is too daunting for her).

"'Amma, maybe you're a mermaid really, taking human form for the love of a man-so that every step is like walking on razor blades!' My mother smiled, but did not laugh" (179). Amina feels responsible for her husband's impotency and her inability to love him as a whole that she is full of guilt. She even blames herself for Monkey's disinterest in feminine qualities, her son's big nose and gambling to support the family. It seems as if catering to human nature and letting some things go isn't what Amina is willing to do for herself. She seems to be striving for an inhuman, or perhaps spiritual, type of life because she can't deal with having to let go of Nadir. According to the Bible, Christ was born in a manger and grew up as a carpenter's son, yet was crucified for the world's sins and is now in Heaven. Amina, then Mumtaz, was tucked away into darkness with Nadir (simpler times) then suddenly thrust up into another marriage, having to pay for her secrets and guilt by being a Christ like figure to everyone else around her.

On page 180, Amina seems to have a fog of guilt around her head (Christ and his crown of thorns, representing and mocking his claim to be the son of God). Everyone who came in contact with Amina felt the need to confess their sins, such as Lila Sabarmati and Hanif. Afterwards, they felt better about themselves. Maybe this air of confession was due to the fact that Amina was regarded as being put together and able to handle everyone else's problems, since she was seen as a Christ like figure (untainted and pure). She is portrayed as a relatively moral woman and I feel Saleem decides to speak about this right before the bathroom incident in order to show the reader that not everybody is as strong as they seem.

Joseph-Rushdie-2/28

The abilities of the Midnight's Children are undoubtedly comic, and Rushdie sets it up from the very beginning: He comments that "synchronicity on such a scale would stagger even C.G Jung." (This is later undermined, or at least I think you could make a case). It must be noted though that for Indian culture, the abilities of the children are, on a whole, not that staggering. Rudhie remarks:"But no literate person in this India can be wholly immune from the type of information I am in the process of unveiling-no reader of our national press can have failed to come across a series of-admittedly lesser- magic children and assorted freaks."

The thing that I find most fascinating is the solipsism that most of the children's gifts create: There is the case of Sundari, whose beauty ultimately leaves her disfigured and she has to hide behind a mask(I found this one particularly interesting because there is a very similar case in 'Infinite Jest');there is a girl who cannot be crossed because her words literally harm others;there is the boy who has the curse of forgetting everything he ever saw(a contrast to the famous Borges story, "Fumes the Memorious").

Rushdie makes a big deal out of talents being greater if a child was born close to the exact minute. However, many of the children's abilities seem haphazard and not adhering to any temporal logic. For example, there are two children who are born rather late but possess pretty enviable powers: Rushdie speaks of a child who believes himself to be a reincarnation of Rabindranath Tagore and "extemporizes verses of remarkable quality". Such a literary and oratory gift would seem to be a valuable power. Also, Rushdie describes late blooming siamese twins, with one head of a boy and one head of a girl, who are able to speak every dialect. That seems like a vital power as well. Does time of birth really play that big of a difference if such great powers are possessed by the supposed 'freaks'? Furthermore, there are some children born closer to the hour who possess some questionable powers: For example, there is a girl who multiplies fish. Given the choice, I would certainly choose the powers of some of the children of the later minutes. There seems to be an element of comedy and mockery in the face of Saleem trying to construct a methodology.

 The biggest instance in support of Saleem's theory is the two births that are closest to the minute: The birth of Saleem and the birth of Shiva; knees and nose. Shiva is given the gift of war, the ultimate divisive action. Saleem is given the gift of communication, the ultimate chance for regeneration. Destruction and regeneration cannot help but be inextricably related, and these two are forever bound together. Many of the children seem comic and random, but it is clear that the timing and proximity of these two births were no accident.

Will - Rushdie - 2/28

On page 189, Saleem writes, "Reality is a question of perspective; the further you get from the past, the more concrete and plausible it seems . . . "  Saleem illustrates this thought with the image of sitting in a large movie theater.  As a person moves closer and closer to the screen, the picture becomes less and less cohesive, until finally " . . . the illusion dissolves­—or rather, it becomes clear that the illusion is reality."  The second part of the book is constructed as if Saleem and the reader are moving closer and closer to the screen of the present.  Even for Saleem, as he gets closer to his present reality the story gets more chaotic, and it is harder for him to understand the order of events.  One needs distance from "reality" in order to make narrative sense of it. 

Narrative cause-and-effect is amplified in movies.  Saleem's uncle Hanif Aziz is a failing director who introduced the world to the "indirect kiss" (162), in which the love of a young couple is expressed by sensuously kissing objects like tea cups in front of each other.  The scene where film language is used most effectively is the scene where Saleem spies on his mother's meeting with Nadir Khan (renamed Qasim) on pages 247-249.  They meet at the Pioneer Cafe, a restaurant frequented by film extras.  Amina and Qasim are both "screen-names" they've taken on to play "half-unwanted roles."  Saleem shoots close-up on a pack of cigarettes on the table between Amina (Mumtaz) and Nadir (Qasim), then their hands enter the frame, hovering above each other but unable to touch.  To signal that they truly love each other, they perform an "indirect kiss," Amina pressing her lips to one side of a glass and Nadir pressing his lips to the other.  Saleem is so shaken that he says, "I left the movie before the end."  Yet the question arises of how Saleem saw all this through a corner of a grimy window?  Does he actually remember this or is it a filmic reconstruction? 

The concept of the "indirect kiss" is the high achievement of Hanif's career.  It shows metaphorically what is dramatized elsewhere in the book:  all love is expressed indirectly.  Aadam Aziz and Nasseem fall in love through a perforated sheet; Mumtaz (Amina) falls in love with Nadir in the shadow shadows of a vault, casting him side-long glances as she changes his chamber pot; Saleem expresses his love for Evie by learning to ride a bike; Brass Monkey shows her sibling love for Saleem by fighting Evie.  No one just says, "I love you," because it is insufficient.  Thus Hanif's "indirect kiss" is a much more realistic image than his scripts about pickle factories.         

Rushdie - post suggestions - 2/28/11

Posts should refer at least partly to 206-271. Make them analytical: try to work out some question of meaning, significance, the structure of the book, etc. Avoid posting generalized responses. Read all the questions. They are intended to spur ideas about this extravagant work of literature.

• relating to the question of religion as a presence in Rushdie's world, consider the transformation of Saleem's mother ("she took on the world's guilt") into a saintly, even Christlike figure just before the bathroom incident.
• the question of impotence: Padma's attempt to cure Saleem using herbs; Ahmed's confession of impotence to Narlikar and Dr. Narlikar's reaction, followed by Narlikar's unexpected passion for his wife... which is described in terms reminiscent of tantric practices... the awakening of chakras and prana (energy) from the lowest to the highest... try to intepret or discuss these strange passages.
• conflict or strife between the sexes: Narlikar's female relatives who wish to build a female-only colony on Methwold's estates after Narlikar's death.. the "strong, hairy-armed women" at the beginning of "All-India Radio." Female bodybuilders in Ghani's house... etc. Are these comic elements or signs of a female revolt or the breakdown of traditional sex roles...?
• Consider the passage at the beginning of "All India Radio." How does the book deal with questions of history and truth as measured and recorded by modern devices: such as radios, medical instruments, movies, public address systems, etc.? If you like, compare this to the problem of truth and history in Naipaul.
• On p. 193, Saleem performs an act of contrition. The story contains many such incidences of punishment and atonement. What are the transgressions for which characters are likely to be punished? What does this say about concepts of authority or morality in the novel? (Power relations in Naipaul were largely social or political. Here power and authority are often within the family...)
• Consider the types of events that lead to Saleem's transformations: an encounter with his nude mother, trauma to one ear at the hands of his father and to another during a bicycle accident... Later, trauma to the nose causes a change in his powers. Why do these mundane physical events (including the time of his birth) - rather than something more mystical or spiritual - cause such transformations? 
• Comment on Sonny's and Saleem's courtship of the American Evie Burns, which involves a lot of bicycle-riding. Bicycling fits with the "carnivalesque" because it is a part of circus life. Consider this in light of love as a whole in the novel.
• Starting on 224, we have a lengthy description of the Midnight's Children, including all their various powers. Comment on Rushdie's choice of powers and abilities. They are not like the Justice League or something. Is there a comic message here?
• Alternatively, comment on the Children as an alternative family in light of the families in the novel in general. Alternatively (again) consider the Children as a parody of some political body (then the novel as a whole would be an allegory).
• p. 242: passage about the selectivity of memory followed by a discussion of world religions: obviously history, autobiography, and folk stories all involve selective memory... The passage may suggest that all stories are "maya" or illusion. Discuss.
• Brahma is a many-headed god: a many-headed monster hardly worshiped in India. On page 217, there is a line referring to language as an "endless ant-trail." This may in turn refer to a famous Hindu story involving a trail of ants. Brahma, remember, is the creator god. Can you relate this story to the idea of creation or building in this novel?
• This book's form may be more associative than linear: that is, it jumps from one thing to another connected thing in a "hypertext" manner, rather than telling a straightforward story. Consider the passage about blood on 258-259, containing the line "Everything has shape if you look for it. There is no escape from form."

Michael Rushdie---------

Bakhtin's concept of dialogism states that language and every idea Incorporated within language is in relation to past constructions of shared definitions and understandings of existence.meaning that everything anybody ever says always exists in response to things that have been said before and in anticipation of things that will be said in response. everything plays off each other, keeping mind all aspect of conciousness past present and future.  In relation to hegemony, the accepted terms and definitons in language and communication must then be placed by the higher classes or dominant classes, Dominic Strinati (1995): Dominant groups in society, including fundamentally but not exclusively the ruling class, maintain their dominance by securing the 'spontaneous consent' of subordinate groups, including the working class, through the negotiated construction of a political and ideological consensus which incorporates both dominant and dominated groups.
 InRushidie writing i see an attempt to break away from the imposed truisms by invoking a voice of hindsight. Rather than accepting the past as it played out Rushide creates a character assuming the highest of classes through narration, thus being given the oppurtunity to create language all together. The carnaveleque is an attempt to break away from set ideologies by pursuing fantasy and the ridiculous in the same way saleem alters the details of his life through his free wheeling narration. saleems truth is seen through his perspective consisting of every truth to be believed in his past.

Jason-Rushdie-2/23-Magical Realism

Given the argument that it may or may not be possible for a Westerner to fully comprehend another culture’s means of communicating about itself, in terms known to itself, and known as “normal” terms within the culture, I think Rushdie’s writing style still combines elements of relatable “realistic” life (that a westerner could understand) with an exaggerated, metaphorical-perspective-taken-for-literal-perspective approach that could be labeled fantastic-realism or even magical realism. One instance of what could be called Rushdie’s magical realist perspective is when the narrator, Saleem, uses his ability to read minds in order to find out “what makes [Evie] tick.” In the passage where this happens, it seems Rushdie is playing with the idea (which comes from the Novel- a western convention, I think) of the narrator’s omnipotent perspective, the ability to go into a(nother) character’s head to find out what they’re thinking, and attributes that power to the character of the narrator within the frame of the story so that it reads like a supernatural, magical power, one that is outside the bounds of a realistic story. But then again, I think Rushdie plays with both the idea of magical-realism as a construction placed upon cultures other than those that are Western and the idea of non-Western cultures having a different conception of what is taken to be literal. He seems to be making magical realism out of conventions of the Novel (which might be an “othering” of the Western perspective for Westerners?) and mixing in exaggerations of cultural perceptions that a Westerner might find unbelievable or magical in the first place.

Karol - Rushdie/Bhaktin -2/22

S0o, I am also reading The Brothers Karamazov and let me tell you the two novels share what Bhaktin calls elements of the canivalesque. I understand this term in reference to sound. At a carnival as one proceeds it is structured to pull at the individual's desires in multiple directions thus disorienting them. For Bhaktin this disorientation is dialectically oppositional but frees up the audience to embrace the actuality of what the expressions and gestures that make up language are saying underneath what they are saying. Bhaktin also revised Aristotle's rhetorical model adding something he calls the "hero." In the case of this book the hero is India in all her manifestations.
The whole of the book employs subjective speakers inter-playing against each other. The language riots (241), the conference, but the example that stuck out to me as particularly Dostoevskian is the scene on p279 where Shiva gives a tirade asking why there is evil in the world (sounds an awful lot like The Grand Inquisitor speech given by Ivan Karamazov).

Hannah-Rushdie-2/23-Bakhtin

"This process is 'multiply enriching' (Ibid), it opens new possibilities for each culture, reveals hidden 'potentials' (Ibid.), promotes 'renewal and enrichment' (Bakhtin, p. 271) and creates new potentials, new voices, that may become realisable in a future dialogic interaction."

"The aspiration of carnival is to uncover, undermine - even destroy, the hegemony of any ideology that seeks to have the final word about the world, and also to renew, to shed light upon life, the meanings it harbours, to elucidate potentials; projecting, as it does an alternate conceptualisation of reality."

Bakhtin's description of dialogism sheds light on Rushdie's style through Saleem's telepathic encounters. As he goes through others' thoughts, such as of a starving infant to the Prime Minister (page 199), Saleem literally reveals "hidden 'potentials'" that wouldn't have been made available unless he was able to connect telepathically. He uses run on sentences on page 194 in order to show his family's thoughts, like his father's fantasies about his secretaries or his uncle's sadness. New voices throughout India are introduced that reveal a different perspective on its culture and also the draining of culture (page 204 -"The businessmen of India were turning white" literally and metaphorically). Being able to listen to the nation's thoughts excites Saleem as first, but also pains him as he realizes his family's and country's issues and faults. "Soon the cracks will be wide enough for them to escape" (205) - perhaps referring to what Saleem gathers from everyone he hears and other midnight children?

Rushdie's decisions to make Saleem represent India is carnivalesque in my opinion because, as mentioned before, he uncovers what others are thinking and their motives for their actions. Rushdie adds a mystical element to this novel, changing what is seen as reality to Saleem and to the people around him.

Dan - 2/23/2011- Rushdie-Magical Realism

Rushdie interjects fantasy with the mundane in Midnight’s Children.  This according to the article is the simple and “straightforward” way of describing the term magical realism. A term that critics have constantly called Midnight’s Children on a certain level Rushdie’s novel does contain this genre very much so. But this may just be the modern eye and due to the times it was written in. It is a historically accurate piece that contains elements of intense and sometimes over looked fantasy. But in Rushdie’s eyes his tale is probably seen more as a modern folklore than that of magic realism. Especially due to the fact the story contains so many references to the other folklores before like the Bible (Aadam/ Adam).  It also relies on (from this much in) the famous hero’s journey (Monomyth’s) format in which  follows a heroes rise to be the “chosen one.” Similar narratives can be seen in The Odyssey, the bible, and Star Wars. 

Rachel - Rushdie, 2/23 (Magical Realism)

I really don't know much about magical realism.  However, the link that Robin posted claims: "The fiction in form and language often embraces the carnivalesque..."


...???


After using Google to figure out what the hell "carnivalesque" means, I found the following passages to be relevant, within the context of Midnight's Children...


(p. 155-156)  Snakes escaping all across India.  Rushdie seems to spend a lot of time on this passage, and it later this ties in with Saleem's favorite board game, snakes and ladders (p. 160)  I have no idea what the significance of any of this is, but I can see that it's there.  Also, there is a snake on the book cover, so cearly this means it has to have some sort of significance!  (I'm getting frustrated because whenever I try to grab this novel by the throat and just pin it down, it slips away!  Maybe that's the symbolism...slippery like a snake.)  But the text does state that "religious leaders described the snake escape as a warning - the god Naga had been unleashed, they intoned, as punishment for the nation's official renunciation of its dieties."


Snakes, particularly cobras, are such mythical animals...a cobra was supposed to have offered the Buddha shade with his hood, no?  So within this context, they're royal.  (Or is that wrong?  To be honest, I'm kind of struggling with the concept of where Hinduism ends and Buddhism begins...)


REGARDLESS...the mythical element remains.  That's apparently a big component of magical realism!


It's Eastern!  It's exotic!  It's got a snake on the book cover!  It's Midnight's Children...magical realism and all.

Joseph-Rushdie-2/23-Bakhtin

For Bahtkin and his theory of dialogism, “Everything means, is understood, as a part of a greater whole — there is a constant interaction between meanings, all of which have the potential of conditioning others. Which will affect the other, how it will do so and in what degree is what is actually settled at the moment of utterance.” Bathkin writes,"Two voices is the minimum for life, the minimum for existence'. A dialogic work carries on a relationship with other texts, and we can observe this in the works of Salman Rushdie. Catherine Pesso-Miquel writes that Rushdie often states that “India only possesses unity and wholeness, purity and authenticity, in a myth invented by the Brahmins.
 India was never one and whole before the English colonization, and the departing English colonizers have left traces which cannot be erased.”


We can see multiple instances of this intertextuality and cultural hybridity in 'Midnight's Children', most notably when comparing it to the works of 'Tristram Shandy' and '1001 Nights'. Rushdie uses Sterne's narrative technique to create a contemporary critique of ideology and identity(Both authors(and books) have fragmented relationships with Britain(Sterne was born in Ireland/Rushdie in India), Both books deal with descent, and both address the nose/penis as a part of identity). In Tristam Shandy, Sterne depicts his characters as people clinging to ideologies, and he enjoys parodying them as the changes in human thought occur. It is a consistent undermining, and one that justifies a rising and falling narrative structure . Rushdie employs this same tactic to raise questions about identity in a much more fragmentary manner: Tristram Shandy describes a book as “a history-book, Sir (which may possibly recommend it to the world) of what passes in a man’s own mind”  while Saleem Sinai describes the book he is creating as a much more robust and wide attempt; a 'swallowing of worlds" where he is everything that came before and everything that will come after. I find it interesting to contemplate the relationship between these two texts, how the execution differs, and how it relates to Bahtkin. 

Will - Rushdie - 2/23 - Bakhtin

The dominant ideology of the Sinai family is that Saleem, the son born at the moment of Indian independence, is destined for great things.  Amina and Mary Pereira lavish attention on the baby, and Saleem is in such high demand that Amina agrees to "lend" Saleem "on a kind of rota basis, to the various families on the hill" (146).  Even the image of happiness and prosperity projected by the Sinai family seems to be geared toward making their son great.  Saleem writes, "For their attentions, they expected, from me, the immense dividend of greatness" (178).  This expectation is a burden for Saleem, and even at nearly-nine he is confused about how to go about achieving this greatness to the satisfaction of his family. 

Saleem's confusion vanishes when he begins hearing voices.  He sees his gift as "the beginning of the repayment of their investment" (187).  Everything in the family is ordered around the ideal of the son destined for greatness, and Saleem cleaves so closely to this ideal that he believes he is become a prophet like Muhammad or Moses.  This special condition is the utmost expression of the hegemonic ideal of the family.  Yet when Saleem reveals his gift, the family is horrified, perhaps because the essence of their ideal has been amplified to the level of obscenity, or because when made so plain by Saleem the family's ideal becomes unrecognizable.  Saleem has accidentally subverted the hegemony of the family by giving the ideal its utmost expression, and the family's reaction is extremely violent.

Listening to his family's thoughts, Saleem continues to see the crack's in the family ideal.

He discovers his father's lust for secretaries, his uncle Hanif's depression over his failing film career (194), and his mother's yearning for Nadir Khan (195).  Saleem's mind becomes a carnival, described by Bakhtin in the reading as offering "the chance to have a new outlook on the world, to realize the relative nature of all that exists, and to enter a completely new order of things."  Central to the carnival is the concept of dialogism, "the plurality of 'fully valid consciousnesses,' each bringing with them a different point of view, a different way of seeing the world."  The voices entering into Saleem's head are part of that dialogism, "the unconscious beacons of the children of midnight, signalling nothing more than their existence, transmitting simply:  'I'" (192).  Each voice he hears helps him see the world in a different way, beyond that of existing hegemonic ideals.

According to Bakhtin, only by "being outside of a culture can one understand his own culture."  It may be that Saleem can tell the story of all India because he can hear the voices of every Indian, seeing beyond hegemonic ideals.  Paradoxically, his gift of hearing all voices makes him a figure on the margins of culture.  Because he is "outside" the culture, he can better understand and represent that culture.

individidualized assignments Rushdie up to page 237

This one requires just a little bit of outside reading and an intellectual experiment. I'm going to ask you to see Rushdie through  a certain critical theory. Each student will be assigned a theory to apply to the novel. You will need to read and understand a short description of the theory, linked in this message. How, in each case, can the theoretical perspective be applied to Midnight's Children?

You should indicate the theoretical perspective with which you're working in the subject line: e.g. Karol - Rushdie - 2/23 - Bakhtin. In class, I will ask each group to expand on their take on Rushdie through the lens of their theoretical approach. You should bring a print out of the theory text that you use. All posts should refer to pp. 133-237. E-mail me if confused.
Here are the assignments and the links you will need:
Karol / Michael / Hannah / Joe: Bakhtin's idea of dialogism. How exactly does this idea shed light on Rushdie's style and the world of his book? Be as specific as you can. (The linked text is about Gramsci and Bakhtin. Read both parts.)

Anna / Joseph / Eidia: Rushdie's world as the expression of a Jungian vision. Whether intentional or not, does Midnight's Children view the self and the world through a Jungian point of view?  Be as specific as you can.

Jason / Rachel / Dan / Will: Rushdie is frequently described as a "magical realist" author. Certainly he has never identified himself as such. And some critics consider our use of the term problematic. Try to evaluate whether or not Mindight's Children belongs in this genre.

Michael - 2/16 - Naipaul

Many factual errors and claims giving rise to questioning are made my saleem as narrator throughtout the novel. He speaks as if telling a story to a dinner party or a close friend eager to understnd his feelings towards his existence in unison with india. For instance he misplaces Gandhi’s death, an obviously monumentall moment in India’s history, as well as willfully misremembers the date of an election. He frets over the accuracy of his story and worries about future errors he might make. Yet, at the same time, after acknowledging his misrepresentation , Saleem decides to maintain his version of events, since that’s how they appeared to occur to him and now there can be no going back. Despite its potential historical inaccuracies, Saleem sees his story as being of equal importance as the world’s most important religious texts. for example he explainsns how this is not only his story but the story if india entirely. the relation between mythical txts i feel lies in the choice to belive them not based upon fact in the same way saleem believes his own story.

Dan - 2/16/2011 Rushdie

The character of Aadam Aziz is necessary because he enables Saleem (or more so Rushdie) to describe the climate of India at that time. It is Rushdie’s foundation for the story.  Especially giving a background description of Kashmir, which is a described as a lush and beautiful place in 1915. Rushdie also makes character development coincide with historical events examples of this can be seen in Saleem being born the hour of India’s Independence. It can also be seen with the war ending as Aadam sees Naseem. These odd coincidences help tie the characters into the historical atmosphere of the story.

What is Rushdie trying to say with these connections?

Hannah-Rushdie-2/16/2011

The prophesy of Saleem's birth on page 96

"There will be two heads-but you shall see only one- there will be knees and a nose, a nose and knees... Newspapers praise him, two mothers raise him... Sisters will weep; cobra will creep... Friends mutilate him - blood will betray him... Soldiers will try him- tyrants will fry him... He will have sons without having sons! He will be old before he is old! And he will die... before he is dead". 

When Mary Pereira switched Saleem at birth, he became Amina's "other" son and even when they found out about the mix up, it didn't make a difference. I'm sure that the "what ifs" of that moment will be echoed throughout the novel as we see both Saleem and Amina's biological son grow up. Because of Mary's guilt, she ends up being Saleem's second mother.

I haven't read past 133 yet, but since Saleem was born on the stroke of midnight of India's independence, he embodies the country and what it is going to go through (and its past). He has telepathic powers "linking him to India's 1,000 other 'midnight children'... endowed with magical gifts" (back cover). These are his metaphorical brothers and sisters that will be (I'm assuming) ravaged by some sort of downfall ("Blood will betray him, etc. etc.). The prophesy says that Saleem will be just as old as his country, meaning he represents India as a whole and everything the country goes through, which means Saleem will go through those moments as well. 

"... cobra will creep..." (96) - After some Googling I found that in India, snakes represent time and accepting the future while abandoning the past. It also has ties with being wise. Saleem will forever be part of the past, as certain circumstances got him where he is now (and mentioning his family history) and will be part of the present and future. It's as if he is some sort of all knowing being (he should have blue skin), closing gaps between time and history.

...and snakes represent eternity - you know, a snake eating its tail - and "Sinai" means snake or something related to snakes. Just a note: Amina hasn't found out about the mixup on p. 133; she assumes that Saleem is her son. We should look back at your post later, because many aspects of the prophecy make more sense as the book goes on. I guess that's the way with prophecies... Robin.

anna –Rushdie- 2/16

There is a lot of life in this book, an exhausting amount, rainbow colors etc..Rushdie seems to know exactly what the reader is thinking and manipulates us (though in a different way from the way Naipaul manipulated us) to believe certain things, to hope for the cause and effect of certain bait traps..and then with us in the palm of his hand he gives the bait away to the air and gives a different answer all together. NOW he has done this multiple times, I am beginning at page 133 to get it. Padma may too. So his parents are not his birth parents, he may not actually have two heads, but what other traps will be laid. How will Musa end the world on accident? (Does musa mean mouse btw?) Who will this other little "something of a shiva" boy be? WellI should hope not what I could expect.

Karol - Rushdie -2/16

xxvi) the peforated sheet is not the only thing with holes in it; before we get to it, on page 5, about Aadam: "Many years later, when the hole inside him had been clogged up with hate, and he came to sacrifice himself..." People, throughout the book, have holes in them.

“One Kashmiri morning in the early spring of 1915, my grandfather Aadam Aziz hit his nose against a frost-hardened tussock of earth while attempting to pray. Three drops of blood plopped out of his left nostril, hardened instantly in the brittle air and lay before his eyes on the prayer-mat, transformed into rubies. Lurching back until he knelt with his head once more upright, he found that the tears which had sprung to his eyes had solidified, too; and at that moment, as he brushed diamonds contemptuously from his lashes, he resolved never again to kiss earth for any god or man. This decision, however, made a hole in him, a vacancy in a vital inner chamber. leaving him vulnerable to women and history.” (15)

The hole in Adam Azziz before it is “clogged up with hate” (16) is created in this scene where he apparently curses god (or stops praying); “a vacancy in a vital chamber” materializes in him. These holes for him are compromises but Nassem they are different.

For Nassem the holes come in her fragmented projections of her love for Aadam become her visage of the perforated sheet. However, this sheet is also figuratively and literally how Aadam sees her, through “brief fragments of her body.” (72) This represents the fragmentary limits of human interaction and how they can never love each other wholly. For Ahmed Sinai the holes converse with each other indiscriminately:

“Each day she selected one fragment of Ahmed Sinai, and
concentrated her entire being upon it until it became wholly
familiar; “My God,” she told
herself, “it seems that there are a million different things to love
about every man!” But she was undismayed. “Who, after all,” she
reasoned privately, “ever truly knows another human being
completely?”(89)

This is striking that she was undismayed - not dismayed that she could never see the whole of him and therefore achieve love... Love, as her duty as a Muslim, is a process for Amina... it appears to be a religious act. .....  Aadam resolved never to kiss earth, creating a hole. Does that mean that the man of science became estranged from the earthy wisdom of the ferryman? Understanding this book is a process, too, which defies completion - I guess. Robin.

Jane- Rushdie- 2/16/11

In reference to Judaism-

Tai pushes the shikara off from the jetty. Spits. Begins to row away. "I Knew it", he says. "You will use a machine now instead of your own big nose" (Rushdie, 17). All of Rushdie's various uses of spit struck me  as having Judaic underpinnings. In the first creation story of Genesis, God forms Adam and Eve out of clay and spit- in the second, he uses his breath. Given the emphasis placed upon ancestry in the Old Testament, it seems as though there is a correlation between the act of spitting and the importance of Saleem's heritage in the narrative. In the passage wherein Tai bids goodbye to Saleem's grandfather as he leaves him at the house that belongs to Ghani, after Tai berates him, Tai seems to cast a foreshadowing of Aziz's future- telling him he will opt for a western object that signifies progress rather than his nose, a mark of his forefathers. The fact that Taj spits as he says this seems to underscore the role of spit as a kind of corollary of Saleem's descendants.

Rachel - Rushdie, 2/16

At first, I was convinced that Mumtaz was going to be Saleem's mother...she is, after all, described as coming out of the womb "black as midnight."  The narrator is born at midnight.  And the book is called, Midnight's Children...durrr.


Anyway...I can see that Rushdie is somehow linking the ideas of dark skin, darkness, and being underground.  Thematically, that's clear.  I'm just not sure what it is he's trying to say.  Does it have something to do with social status?  We are in a country where the caste system is rampant.  Does it have to do with emasculation?  (Nadir Kahn is a poet and a refugee, both of which are kind of "unmanly" things - and my gender studies mind twitches at the use of this word - to be.   He even gets chased out of the cellar after they realize Mumtaz is still a virgin.  Feminization?  Yin and Yang, or is that too Confuscius for this book?

Young Mumtaz remarries later, in June, the bright, sunshiney month.


...???


I'm not really sure what to write about all these things.  I can just see that they're slowly being developed as themes, and inevitably they'll be woven together, like threads.  But if I made preemptive judgement, I'd be just talking out of my ass.


Not trying to be crude...just honest.  Arrrgh.

Well, you're right. And this is how the reader feels... how to make sense of all these things. And will they be woven together? After all, the tale of birth and ancestry turned out to be the wrong tale! Robin.