Victory City: A Novel by Salmam Rushdie- 2023 -336 Pages

 Victory City: A Novel by Salmam Rushdie- 2023 -336 Pages

A New York Times Best Seller

I have been an avid reader of Salman Rushdie for 12 years. Victory City lived up to my very high expectations 

Brilliantly structured as a translation of an ancient epic, Victory City is a saga of love, adventure, and myth that is in itself a testament to the power of storytelling. It is steeped in reimagined Indian History and classic epics.

"In the wake of an unimportant battle between two long-forgotten kingdoms in fourteenth-century southern India, a nine-year-old girl has a divine encounter that will change the course of history. After witnessing the death of her mother, the grief-stricken Pampa Kampana becomes a vessel for a goddess, who begins to speak out of the girl’s mouth. Granting her powers beyond Pampa Kampana’s comprehension, the goddess tells her that she will be instrumental in the rise of a great city called Bisnaga—“victory city”—the wonder of the world.

Over the next 250 years, Pampa Kampana’s life becomes deeply interwoven with Bisnaga’s, from its literal sowing from a bag of magic seeds to its tragic ruination in the most human of ways: the hubris of those in power. Whispering Bisnaga and its citizens into existence, Pampa Kampana attempts to make good on the task that the goddess set for her: to give women equal agency in a patriarchal world. But all stories have a way of getting away from their creator, and Bisnaga is no exception. As years pass, rulers come and go, battles are won and lost, and allegiances shift, the very fabric of Bisnaga becomes an ever more complex tapestry—with Pampa Kampana at its center." From the Publisher"

There are numerous themes in Victory City, the transience of power, love and beauty. The impact of losing those we love. The various religious ideologies of the period are portrayed. Some rulers are kind but most are cruel. Millions die for their Vanity.

Victory City is a very creative highly imaginative work. 

Mel Ulm

"The Shelter of the World" by Salmon Rushdie (Feb 25, 2008, The NewYorker)

My Posts on Salman Rushdie

If Salman Rushdie (there is background information in my prior posts) never receives the Nobel Prize it can be attributed to the fear of the petrol-dollar.   Rushdie's prose is lush and his imagery is magnificent.  His plots are incredibly imaginative, often drawn from elements of Indian history and culture.  There is no place with an older literary culture than India.  Edmund Burke tried to tell the English this.

"The Shelter of the World", available for a while in the archives of The New Yorker, is a historical work of magic realism centering on the Mogul ruler Akbar. The story very imaginatively takes us inside the mide of Akbar and lets us see how being raised to see your self as a divine being and ruler since birth impacts a mind.  Akbar comes to see himself as being India, the world is defined by the limits of his ego.  He has many wives but his true love is an imaginary wife he conjured up.  

The story really helps us see how a divine ruler might see his domain and himself.  Rushdie does a great job of bring the capital city to life and showing us how the ordinary people are impacted by Akbar.

If you have never read Rushdie, this story will give you an excellant feel for his work.

You can read it here.

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/02/25/the-shelter-of-the-world

Mel u

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"Good Advice is Rarer Than Rubies" by Salmon Rushdie

"Good Advice is Rarer Than Rubies" by Salmon Rushdie (1994, 12 pages)

Short Stories of the Indian Subcontinent

A Reading Life Project

No culture has older literary roots than that of the Indian subcontinent.   Edmund Burke was right when he told the English leadership they had no right to rule a country whose culture was much older than theirs.  

Salmon Rushdie (Bombay, 1947)  is one of the very greatest of living writers.   He has won many top literary awards.   If he does not one day win the Nobel Prize it can be only from fear of the wrath of petro-dollars.   I have previously posted on his 1981 Midnight's Children and The Enchantress of Florence.   I love his rich prose and his blending of styles.   

"Nice Story, funny when I applied
for a British Visa the Ambassador
expedited it"- Carmilla

"Good Advice Is Rarer Than Rubies" is a very entertaining easy to follow and understand story about  a young woman seemingly seeking a visa to go to England and an old man who makes his living by preying upon Visa seekers.   Visa application day at the British consulate is Tuesday and the old man is always there, looking for country women, the younger then better, coming to apply to a Visa.   When he spots a likely mark, he will pull her aside with an avuncular manner and tell her of the horrors she may face inside the consulate.   He tells his victims they will be asked many trick questions, that they maybe asked very personal questions and he tells them without inside knowledge they have little chance to get a Visa.  He looks for women who have come a long way by bus, the more country the better.   He tells them he can offer them some very good advise and he looks over their Visa application.   Then if they have not offered him money yet he tells them their only hope is to pay him so he can get his  "friend at the consulate" to approve their Visa.   Many of the women are joining husbands or husbands to be from arranged marriages or family in England so they are desperate to go.  The way the process works is one applies and then waits for the mail.   He picks country women as he knows they are less likely to come back looking for him when they finally figure out he is a fraud.    

He picked what seems like a perfect victim.   A young pretty country girl who is applying for a Visa so she can join her finance in London.   When she was nine her parents arranged that she  would one day be married to a man thirty years older than her, she has no memory of ever seeing him.   She turns the tables on the old con-man and I will let you discover the rest of this story yourself.   It is really a lot of fun to read.

It first appeared in East, West:  Stories, a collection of Salmon Rushdie's short stories.  

I have on my TBR list and my IPAD, The Satanic Verses and The Moor's Last Sigh and hope to read them soon.

Mel u