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Rushdie through the lens of Quichotte.

 

Quichotte by Salman Rushdie is the type of book that I loved so much that I wanted to savor every moment by reading it slowly but also devouring it as fast as possible because of the beautifully evolving story. The story follows a person named Ismail, who is addicted to watching too many TV shows. He creates his alter ego Quichotte, and goes on a road trip through America to make a famous TV show host fall in love with him. Here Salman Rushdie takes a unique way of storytelling, wherein in the second chapter of the book he introduces the author who is writing the story of Quichotte (Ismail), it is like fiction inside another fiction. This brings us to the genre of this book – a Metafiction. The life of the author is the reflection of the story of Quichotte. At a certain point in the book, the reality of the author’s life gets intertwined with the fiction of Quichotte’s story, perplexing the reader with Rushdie’s effortless storytelling.

Quichotte is a brilliantly funny work. It was quite surprising for me since I’ve read a few books of Rushdie (not many) to find his work to be this much satirical. Then I revisited his previous works and a lot of his interviews and realized that satire and telling serious stories in a rather fun way was his strength. It was me who was being naïve and failed to see it all along. I read Midnight’s Children way too early, I loved that book, but I failed to properly understand it. I need to reread it.

Salman Rushdie is one of the literary geniuses of our generation. His works will be considered classics in the future. Quichotte will top that list. His narration was so fine with strength and confidence. The level of imagination in Quichotte is mesmerizing. He effortlessly blends reality with fiction. Magical realism is not the word that I will use to define his works, although this story has its share of absurdity. Like the insect that speaks English with an Italian accent, large mastodons wearing blazers and marching for protest, and a person born out of a wish who is monochrome in color, still, I could not consider it to be of authentic Latin American origin; that is magical realism. Rushdie has a format of blurring the line between reality and dream, that stands out from the traditional magical realism, surrealism, or absurdism. It lingers and reflects on reality very much and to make the reader realize the impact of reality, he levels up the absurdity in it. So it perfectly works as a metaphor but also in a single glance, it can be seen as a sheer absurdity.

There were moments in this book where I laughed so hard. It is not a silly/funny book but filled with so much irony and satire. So much so that I rolled about laughing in certain portions. The ending of the book takes a great turn, giving it the perfect climax. It has everything in it to become a great read that stays with you forever. This book was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 2019, and my next read will be the winner of the 2019 Booker Prize winner. Just to see what can top this book.

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