I would compare this extraordinary memoir by an extraordinary man to The Tale of Genji - both of them are "firsts" in their culture. The descendants of Tamerlane were both ruthlessly crafty Central Asian kings and warriors, and ultra refined conoisseurs of art and architecture, poetry, food, gardens, and (alas for them) wine. The Baburnama has it all. To encounter the private thoughts of a great conquerer is a unique experience. The Baburnama is well-written and well translated. It is one of the great treasures of literature, and will give the reader a much better idea why Afghanistan and Central Asia are the way they are.

Babur, a descendant of both Timur and Genghis Khan, was a truly remarkable man: a soldier and a poet, an inspirational leader with a deep appreciation for the beauties of nature - and a sensitivity that seems striking to us in a warrior of his undoubted stature.

His memoirs are a detailed, entertaining, and highly personal view of a changing world. In leading his followers into northern India, he laid the groundwork for the Mughal Empire, one of the great Islamic powers of the early modern period - and it is this achievement that history primarily remembers him for. Yet the _Baburnama_ shows that there is considerably more to the story than its conclusion.

With unstinting and engaging honesty, Babur talks of his early struggles, his constant setbacks, and his lifelong desire to hold Samarkand, glorious seat of his ancestor Timur (Tamerlane). For Babur, India is only the consolation prize after his failure to reconquer the lands of his birthright; India is rich, yes, astoundingly so, but it is far removed from his fond reminiscences of home. Along the way, reports of skirmishes with his enemies, and the constant betrayals of his allies, share the page with descriptions of local flora and fauna, and fascinating observations on everyday life in the cities and towns that he spends time at - and it is here that the work's true enjoyment lies.

Bear with the initially confusing internecine squabbles of the Central Asian nomads, and you'll be richly rewarded. A comprehensive and compelling insight into both Central Asia at the turn of the sixteenth century, and the day-to-day pressures inherent in the leadership of an empire based on conquest.

Babur was a king in the true sense of the word. His autobiography outlines his feirceness as a warrior as well as his compassion toward the people in his court. Although he lived in a time where one would think there would be little time for introspection, this is exactely what his narrative is: and introspective look at his own life, his shortcomings, his downfalls, his triumphs and tragedies. One is touched by Babur's humbleness, his sensitivity towards some of the most simple of things, and at his sense of awe and appreciation of beauty in the world around him. Although in some ways I prefered the AS Beveridge translation, this is also a wonderful translation with beautiful pictures and notes in the margins to help explain things. Even if you are not normally interested in this type of book, Babur leads you into his world and you are compelled to read on!

Book Description: Magical realism has become almost synonymous with Latin American fiction, but this way of representing the layered and often contradictory reality of the topsy-turvy, late-capitalist, globalizing world finds equally vivid expression in U.S. multiethnic and British postcolonial literature and film. Writers and filmmakers such as Oscar "Zeta" Acosta, Ana Castillo, Julie Dash, Hanif Kureishi, and Salman Rushdie have made brilliant use of magical realism to articulate the trauma of dislocation and the legacies of colonialism that people of color experience in the postcolonial, multiethnic world. This book seeks to redeem and refine the theory of magical realism in U.S. multiethnic and British postcolonial literature and film. The author engages in theoretically sophisticated readings of Ana Castillo's So Far from God, Oscar "Zeta" Acost's Autobiography of a Brown Buffalo, Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children, Shame, The Satanic Verses, and The Moor's Last Sigh, Julie Dash's Daughters of the Dust, and Stephen Frears and Hanif Kureishi's Sammy and Rosie Get Laid. Coining the term "magicorealism" to characterize these works, Aldama not only creates a postethnic critical methodology for enlarging the contact zone between the genres of novel, film, and autobiography, but also shatters the interpretive lens that traditionally confuses the transcription of the real world, where truth and falsity apply, with narrative modes governed by other criteria.

Reviews:
"In this exciting new book, Frederick Luis Aldama has done an outstanding job of remapping 'magical realism"--Werner Sollors, Henry B. and Anne M. Cabot Professor of English Literature and Professor of Afro-American Studies, Harvard University.

"Frederick Luis Aldama offers a vigorous revisionary perspective on postcolonial literature and, more specifically, on the much discussed phenomenon of magicorealism. He has a commanding knowledge of postcolonial theory, and he performs a welcome critical task in demonstrating how it tends to confuse the confines of the academy with the contours of the real world, textuality with ontology. Aldama himself is a political critic, but he sanely argues that the arena of any serious politics is the world of living people and not a text"--Robert Alter, Professor of Comparative Literature, University of California at Berkeley and author of Canon and Creativity.

"Providing a lucid and cogent critique of the tendency in contemporary criticism to ontologize "magical realism," a tendency that implicitly articulates a relatively simple mimetic relationship between "magical realism" and various postcolonial cultures, Frederick Aldama instead posits a theory of what he calls "rebellious mimetics" that introduces a complex aesthetic and political mediation in that relationship. In doing so, he weaves together a series of excellent analyses of novels and films by authors and artists as diverse as Salman Rushdie, Ana Castillio, Oscar Zeta Acosta, Julie Dash, and Hanif Kureishi. This is a very significant contribution to the study of this genre"--Abdul R. JanMohamed, Professor of English, University of California, Berkeley.

"In this insightful and forceful study of magical realism, Aldama successfully argues that a true postethnic and postcolonial criticism should not (con)fuse the world with the text. His commentaries on Castillo, Dash, Kureishi, Acosta, and Rushdie force the readers to see these artists' magicorealist works in a new light, thus revealing all of their splendid and contradictory complexities. Aldama's book is a must for anyone who wishes to understand the intricacies of magical realism and the vitality of this genre in contemporary European postcolonial and ethnic American literature and scholarship"--Emilio Bejel, Professor of Spanish American Literature, University of Colorado at Boulder and author of Gay Cuban Nation.

"Through a study of the playful narrative techniques of writers and film-makers such as Dash, Garcia Marquez, Rushdie and Kureishi, Frederick Luis Aldama offers a powerful critique of those who view magical realism as either a means toward postcolonial resistance or as a depiction of some exotic real world. Proposing a "postethnic" approach, Aldama argues convincingly that a reader's or viewer's understanding of the aesthetic dimensions of what he calls "magicorealism" can lead to greater political understanding than older, more ideologically oriented interpretations"--Herbert Lindenberger, Avalon Professor of Humanities, Emeritus, Stanford University.

"It is rare that we come across a truly great book, one in which fierce intelligence asserts itself in pages that truly matter. Such a book assigns us the task of reordering what we have taken as true on the promise of an understanding more profound. In such a book, we are guided by extraordinary vision, by an author with keen insight. In the rarest of occasions, we read words that are wise, words that make broad connection and interrogate a range of thought that afterwards we deem necessary. Postethnic Narrative Criticism is such a book; Frederick Aldama is such an author"--Alfred Arteaga, Associate Professor of Ethnic Studies, University of California, Berkeley.

This work offers a highly valuable rethinking of magical realism, one that assesses previous work in new ways, one that extends the historical reach of arguments about magical realism, and one that brings a new level of sophistication to arguments about it"--Carl Guitierrez-Jones, Professor and Chair, University of California, Santa Barbara.

Enfin! Postethnic Narrative Criticism is the first book in ethnic and postcolonial literary and film studies that cuts through Gordian knots that arise from confusing narrative fiction (a complexly organized aesthetic that uses point of view, style, and genre to engage readers) with the facts that make up our reality outside of the text.
This is a must read for any reader interested in moving away from studies--poststructrualist or otherwise--that lead to dead ends.
It is a must read for readers tired of jargon and fundamental misconceptions of what novels and films can do in the world at large.

Calling for active participation from knowledgeable and intelligent readers, Post-Ethnic Narrative Criticism serves as a well drawn out map for literary exploration through an innovative approach to understanding complicated literature and films. Thought his engagement as an author, Aldama speaks directly to his audience in a manner that is candid, forthright, and compelling. Although this is a difficult text- one that must not be taken lightly, this work acknowledges real dilemmas of real peoples, and offers up a critically and emotionally balanced understanding of the often-subtle dilemmas of contemporary narratology confronting such peoples.
As a result of my own time spent with this text I have walked away with a greater understanding of how narrative techniques inform textual spaces of those who are often placeless, and how this (dis)location functions both inside and out of the academy.

I found this book helpful, informative and inspiring. I applaud the courage, spirit and conviction of those who contributed to this volume who spoke up and exercised their international human right of freedom of expression on behalf of Rushdie's own legal right to the same right under international human rights law. May the author Salman Rushdie continue to write award-winning fiction celebrated around the world by discriminating readers and writers and may there always be courageous and conviction-filled individuals who refuse to be intimidated by terrorists and other thugs who commit criminal acts around the world in violation of recognized international legal norms

Most people don't realize that the film-making industry of India (called "Bollywood" by some Westerners) puts Hollywood to shame by sheer size and appeal. Having Rushdie, a student of Indian film and an infamous scholar, review "The Wizard of Oz" from his own unique point of view, is priceless. Rushdie spends more time than most going through the mythological meanings and symbolic imagery of the film, and leaves out much of the popular emphasis on MGM's prestige and the legacy of Judy Garland, which offers a refreshing perspective on the film. A highly recommended read, and one which will make you want to explore other BFI commentaries.

'The Wizard of Oz' is a miraculous rarity in the history of cinema. It is an intricately structured work, whose themes, images, narratives and characters echo and refract each other across its story. Surely for this to be possible, we would expect the over-arching organising sensibility of a Great Auteur, a Hitchcock or a Hawks. But 'Oz' has none - neither the writer of the source novel, L. Frank Baum; nor the many scriptwriters usually at each others' throats; nor the producers Mervyn Leroy or Arthur Freed; not the directors, credited and uncredited, can claim the honour of solely creating this masterpiece. Out of a series of accidents came a near-perfect work, just as out of the Big Bang, the intricacy of living organimsms, 'simply happened'. As Salman Rushdie remarks, 'Oz' is 'an authorless text'.

Rushdie's many insights into this film - which is so far beyond labels such as 'great' or 'art' or 'important' that it has shaped the cultural consciousness of audiences the world over for decades - are more literary than cinematic. After a charming introduction, in which the for-its-time-spectacular-and-fantastic 'Oz' is considered quite routine for a child who grew up with the excesses of Bollywood, he sits down at the TV with a notebook in hand, throwing out ideas and interpretations as he goes along. His main idea is that, in spite of the sell-out ending (as he perceives it), the film's message is not 'there's no place like home', but that once you undertake the kind of journey Dorothy makes, you can never go back, you must make your own homes, your own destiny (Rushdie, in hiding from the Ayotollah and his fatwa when the book was written, remakes Dorothy in his migrating image). The film up to this point has been so radical and liberating, that Rushdie sees the ending as the usual Hollywood moralising.

I've always thought that if your theory has to reject some of the text, than it's not much of a theory; but Rushdie is persuasive. His description of monochrome Kansas as hell-on-earth; his account of Dorothy's growth and the wonder of colourful Oz; his charting the rites-of-passage that reveals to Dorothy the inadequacy of adults; are intelligent and witty. His reverie on the fate of movie stand-ins, the audience's relationship to stars and film, and on the conflict between the idealism of a film and the reality of its making; is beautifully, philosophicallly moving. His singling out genius wordsmith Yip Harburg and that unforgettble witch Margaret Hamilton, is generous.

On the downside, his short-sighted cavilling over inconsistencies sees him miss the point on a few occassions; and the appendix, a short story 'At the Auction of the Ruby slippers', which with laboured and long-winded 'humour' fails to ape the post-modern, culture-conscious fantasy of Angela Carter (to whom the mongraph is dedicated), is unreadable.

This is a beautiful and moving meditation on the meaining of The Wizard of Oz. Rushdie teases all the deep emotional resonances out of the film. The book is also visually stunning, with great stills. A great read. Thanks Salman Rushdie for sharing your thoughts and feelings.

Written shortly after the major events surrounding the Rushdie Conflict (though not before the murder of the Japanese translator of the Satanic Verses), Daniel Pipes provides major insight and perspective into the root causes of this international conflagration. He provides both a breakdown of Rushdie's work, and an explanation of the translation difficulties that further encouraged misunderstanding about the Book's actual contents. He appears to have a steady grasp of Arabic by the bibliography and transliteration, consonant with a fair amount of expertise in analyzing Islam. He provides the Islamic rationales for trying Salman Rushdie for apostasy, and indicates the questionableness of Khomeini's method (not the penalty itself) even under Islamic standards.(Gotta give 'em a trial, a chance to repent over three days, and then chop-chop- at least for the Sunni variety of Islam, though the various madhdhabs or schools of jurisprudence differ on the exact details of divinely sanctioned murder.) After reading the Satanic Verses, I whole heartedly concur that because of its level of erudition and numerous allusions to less familiar (to Westerners) stories from the salvation history of Islam to South Asian culture, it is no surprise how few people actually read the entire novel. But what is rather disturbing about human nature, is that this didn't stop complete Ignoramuses from opining- Pipes provides a multitude of quotes indicating the level of hearsay fed to the masses. Pipes also emphasizes the unprecedented scale of this eruption of world-wide riots and protests, citing works critical of Islam with far graver blasphemies. One blasphemous volume mentioned by Pipes that I found enjoyable was 23 years- a critical biography of the Prophet Muhammad by Ali Dashti, who although Pipes doesn't make reference to it, "disappeared" in 1980's Iran.

Pipes also mentions some of the effects the conflict had on the front lines of bookselling and publishing, pondering over the possible changes the death threats and bombings inaugrated by religious fervor. A decade later, I don't know how to guage his power of prophecy, but his commentary on the complex intersecting issues remain both incisive and fascinating.

Here is one example: the title of Rushdie's book. Pipes explains that while in English "the Satanic verses" is a plain ordinary phrase that refers to an embaraasing event in Islamic history, this phrase is not used in Arabic. Most Muslims won't recognize the event by that designation; Muslims call it something quite different. But when "verses" is translated into Arabic the word used refers specifically to Quranic verses. So the title is translated roughly as "The Satanic Verses of the Quran" or "The Satanic Quran".

Don't assume from this that Pipes if profferring an apologetic. He is not; this book is critical of "fundamentalist Islam". But Pipes is careful to explain how such Muslims think and react.

Salman Rushdie is brilliant. He knows who to derive from and steal from: James Joyce being one of his main sources. Good for him. If you're going to steal, steal from the best. Joyce's footprints are all over THE SATANIC VERSES. I felt at home. And Rushdie's tough and demanding like Joyce. Even moreso because he's dealing with issues western readers are not familiar with. So you have to go slow and get internet help (plenty available). Slowly, the novel begins to take shape. It's a book of dreams and nightmares bounded by the first and last very moving chapters about Chamcha's domestic crises with his father and ensuing alienation. Chamcha's torn between cultures, a lost searching soul, an alienated man. He's also an intellectual prig who wears many protective masks to conceal his sufferings and with which he explores religious and emotional wanderings. Read the first and last chapters to make contact with the down to earth domestic issues of the novel. Very moving. In between, you have this massive and intensive and witty and funny and dark and brilliant exploration of Muslim religion as seen from a willing/unwilling, searching unbeliever's point of view. He mocks and participates all at the same time. The language is gorgeous because it moves on many levels--from slang to pop to literary to religious, back and forth--and from the point of view of two languages and cultures. At one minute it's blasphemous, at another it's holy...and it's always a rich and makes the reader smile, smile, smile at the author's brilliance and learning. It's linguistic magic. What does it all add up to? You got me. I haven't scratched the surface. It may or may not add up. Talk to me in a year.

This book is sort of the Arabian Nights + Princess Bride, with a little Alice in Wonderland thrown into the mix. When Rashid, a storyteller known as the Shah of Blah, loses the ability to tell stories, his son Haroun sets out to find out what has happened. With the help of Iff the Water Genie and a cast of colorful characters he finds out that forces of Darkness are polluting the Sea of Stories.

It's all a thinly veiled allegory for Islam trying to silence the author after his Satanic Verses was published, but it's deftly handled & often quite amusing. Rushdie does an especially nice job with word plays & puns & the book requires rereading & reading aloud to catch them all, which makes it a perfect book for adults to read to older kids.

GRADE: B

Poor Haroun. His mother has run off with the dull neighbor, leaving his father, the Shah of Blah, without any stories to tell, so dispirited is he over his wife's departure. Haroun, who has recently questioned the value of his father's work, as is the wont of most 12 year olds to do, finds himself off on an adventure to recapture the stories his father must have.

Part fantasy, part allegory and always clever and engaging, the story told of Haroun's adventures speaks to the power of story in our lives and in the world. The constant word play and twists of language are funny, though at times I felt they became just "too much." While we are being entertained by maniac bus drivers, strange genies and odd fish, Haroun and his father both are coming to terms with the things in the world that truly matter. This is one of those rare books, written for adult readers, that children will enjoy read aloud, cuddled up next to you on the couch, swept away by the fantasy.

This was the first Rushdie book that I have read, but I am very impressed. He has an amazing knack for storytelling. It was evident that he had a plan in mind when he began writing the book rather than just letting the story meander without purpose like some authors are prone to do. This is the story of a boy named Haroun who tries to help his father, a storyteller, regain his ability to tell stories. His father had always told him that his storytelling abilities came from something called the "Sea of Stories". Haroun was surpised to find that this was, in fact a real sea located on the earth's elusive 2nd moon. Haroun travels there and is acquainted with magnificent characters such as the Water Genie, the flying mechanical bird the Hoopoe, the Shadow Warrior (who's shadow has a personality of it's own), Pages that look like pages. The book wouldn't be complete without a villain: Kattam Shud. It's the age-old story of good versus evil with a new twist. It's also a fanciful explanation of where good stories come from and how good stories get tainted. The book is quick-paced and can be read in 3 to 4 short sittings. It's not so much suspenseful as it is refreshing and enjoyable. However, why does Rushdie use apostrophes instead of quotation marks during dialogue?

If you have ever read Salman Rushdie, this book is a perfect way to get inside his head. He tells you all about his trials, tribulations, and happy endings he has went through during his lifetime. This book is a great buy!

Salman Rushdie is one of my favorite novelist' The Ground Beneath Her Feet' and 'The Moor's Last Sigh' are just two of his masterpieces. Rushdie has but together a collection of wonderful Essays. Rushdie gives his thoughts and insights on the Wizard of Oz, Arthur Miller, rock music, leavened bread, Ghandi ( did you know he liked to sleep with naked young girls to show everyone he could do it without indulging). Soccer (not even Rushdie can make that boring game sound interesting).

I didn't need to know about movies that where never made, And some of his answers for problems seemed rather naive. But most of all he made me thing a different way on a lot of subjects.

Rushdie's latest book lays bare a mind that is on the one hand poetic and reflective, and on the other incisive, witty and analytical. It collects essays, newspaper pieces and columns on diverse topics written and published over the last ten years. The subjects include the children's classic, The Wizard of Oz, essays on specific individuals (like Angela Carter, J.M. Coetzee, Arthur Miller), 'Messages from the Plague Years' (select pieces written during the 10 years of the fatwa), syndicated columns for the New York Times (including the outstanding piece on 'Amadou Diallo'), and the recent Tanner Lectures delivered at Yale. Altogether they make impressive reading, the musings of a brilliant author inviting the reader to take up challenges, step across all daunting lines of control, and explore new territories.

Rushdie can be ruthless and hardhitting, as in his piece 'Not About Islam?' which calls a spade a spade. He can be maddeningly provocative, as in the Introduction to his Vintage Anthology of Indian Writing in English (collected here as 'Damme, This Is the Oriental Scene for You!' with a half-sheepish footnote and a slight toning down of his earlier abrasive remarks on regional literatures). He can be passionate in his indignation against racial injustice, and expansive in his appreciation of rock music. But at all times his good humour, his sense of mischief, plays peek-a-boo with his most profound beliefs. He thumbs his nose unselfconsciously at stuff-shirts, no matter how high a pedestal they occupy. He refers en passant to Shashi Deshpande's 'curdled judgments'; he dismisses with a shrug the divine aspirations of 'dharma bums'; he does not like the way J.M. Coetzee writes (not surprising this, for Rushdie and Coetzee are two writers as different from each other as the strong and gusty autumnal wind is from the brilliant but freezing December sun!).

Rushdie is a superb raconteur. He does not get freighted down with his sweeping range of knowledge nor does he resort to obfuscating jargon (behind which a lot of contemporary theorists love to take refuge). Punctuating his torrent of ideas with interesting anecdotes and asides, he can hammer home his ideas. On page after page we encounter the unexpected bends and rugged textures of his terrain as he shows us the different trees that he can climb. Sometimes he tosses us ripe mangoes, sometimes we get the pits!

The over-riding metaphor of the two Yale lectures in particular, and the entire volume in general, is the frontier and its host of connotations. This 'fixed and shifting' line is the backdrop against which he chooses to view human existence. What is the 'frontier consciousness' that we must cope with? How are borders made and what do these artificial, man-made dividing lines symbolize today? -- such questions are raised and the author gives us tentative answers. The idea of freedom is involved in his metaphor, so is the figure of the frontier-less migrant who emerges as the archetypal figure of the present times.

What an Indian reader would perhaps look for, and sadly miss, in the present volume is some Indian inspiration. True, there is a free sprinkling of names and events from India, but in these pieces composed over the last decade, the soul seem to be alien. While Rushdie waxes eloquent on U2, Shaggy, film festivals, electoral scenes and other events that make popular news in the western world, he seems to have moved far from the Midnight era and lost touch with the mass culture of India, the popular icons, the songs and singers, the prolific Bombay film industry et. al. Quite understandable, given his circumstances, but saddening all the same.

Moreover, through all the discussion on stepping across different lines, one would look - and look in vain - for some reference to the Lakshman Rekha, which is probably the first idea that would strike a reader from the Indian subcontinent. And in all those pages on the frontier one would expect at least one mention of 'sarhad' - the highly evocative and irreplaceable word (from the author's own mother-tongue!) for the dividing line between two nations, invoking the sarhad-i-suba and all the myths and legends of the frontier province. But, no. Apparently Rushdie has moved far from his roots, too deep into American culture. In the last thirteen years he has crossed many frontiers and each frontier-crossing, as he tells us, changes us: we become the frontiers we cross. So the consciousness that we encounter in this volume is one that belongs to the world: it is not an Indian spirit but a spiritus mundi that pervades his works.

As an author he takes his job seriously. For him, inspired by the poet Faiz, a writer has a dual role - part private and part public, part dream and part responsibility. 'The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, / But in ourselves that we are underlings,' he quotes Shakespeare. We are what we choose to be: we may choose to remain underlings and 'find ourselves dishonorable graves' or we may step out of the 'underling' slot, face the risks involved, attempt to change the world - and be irrevocably changed in the process. The choice is ours.

'When the imagination is given sight by passion,' says Rushdie, 'it sees darkness as well as light. To feel so ferociously is to feel contempt as well as pride, hatred as well as love. These proud contempts, this hating love....' all this and much more are offered here in Step Across This Line.

Although Rushdie makes a half-hearted attempt to argue otherwise, Shame is obviously an allegory of Pakistani politics from the time of Pakistan's creation to the downfall of General Zia. Many of Rushdie's trademarks are on display. Historical and cultural influences are important to Rushdie, as he likes to trace families back several generations in order to explain the development of his main character(s). Once again we have several characters representing chauvinist, extremist elements, and Rushdie astutely portrays how they gain influence in political circles at the highest level. Rushdie also likes to blend fantasy with reality, and it is often difficult to know when to take him literally or not. I just recently read "One Hundred Years of Solitude" for the first time, and I realize retrospectively how much Rushdie borrows from Marquez and other magical realists. Thus, if you like this kind of writing, you will love this book. Even if you don't care for the magical realist style, however, you can still appreciate Rushdie's political and social insights. And even if you don't know or care about Pakistan, you can enjoy his remarkable wit and his flowing prose.

I have to say that I found this book much more comprehensible than The Satanic Verses. It's basically about Pakistan with all of its contradictions, faults and absurdity. It's eitehr a love letter or a hate letter to his home country and it's a history told in the magical realism style where every major political movement is started by a private incident and evey private exchange is fraught with dangers. He also calls Bhutto Virgin Ironpants - which I'm sure would have annoyed many feminists as much as the Ayatollah passages in The Satanic Verses annoyed the entire country of Iran. (oh, I'm sorry the official stance is that it was the Muhammed passages)

But for all its brilliance and nuance what I and my friends remember is the debate among the rebels over whether to have sex with teh docile sheep or the wild goats. Not even the people fighting the hostile regime are safe from scorn and ridicule.

The central metaphor is in two characters - one a man without shame and the other a woman who is embarrassed and overtly modest from birth. When she loses her modesty, she becomes a vicious animal destroying all in her path. I think that is the theme in that the country might be run by the shameless and the crass, but when the silent ones are pushed too far - watch out.

Even as a minor book this proves Rushdie's clarity of vision and his place as one of the greatest writers of teh 20th century.

Let me start by saying that if you have never read a Salman Rushdie book before, I do not recommend that this be your first. My first encounter with Rushdie was Haroun and the Sea of Stories, a friend of mine began to appreciate his writing after reading Midnight's Children. Stick to those (or perhaps East, West) if you are a Rushdie neophyte. Shame is not necessarily the best introduction to one of the best writers of the 20th century.

Why, you might ask? The fact is that Shame homes in on a specific theme and doesn't let go. The book is essentially about the birth of Pakistan and its painful, turbulent early years. It is so focused on these themes that Rushdie goes so far as to include personal asides in the middle of the prose in order to further clarify the points he is making. Shame is a fun, clever and tremendously enjoyable novel but I can see people being put off by an almost educational, preachy tone in these little asides.

Don't get me wrong.... Shame is a GREAT book! For any of you who are familiar with Rushdie's style, you will find that he is up to form here. The plot is full of clever devices (much like in The Moor's Last Sigh) which will have you placing the book down, simply awestruck at the inventiveness and foresight.

What else can I say? I am enraptured with Rushdie. Anyone interested in reading simply astounding prose needs to do themselves a favor and read this author's work. Be forewarned though, this in not a light afternoon read, it requires a certain intellectual investment.

These stories are extremely engrossing. Carter puts her unique spin on familiar fairy tales, while creating a few new ones of her own. These aren't your grandmother's fairy tales. Carter's work is filled with contradictions and mutations of beauty, profanity, humor, and the macabre, whether told richly as in "The Loves of Lady Purple", or more subtly as in "The Fall River Axe Murders". These dark, beautiful, magical stories are more akin to what fairy tales were originally like before they got all cleaned up.

Carter's stories are so beautifully-written I find myself wanting to read them aloud. If only five or so collections of short stories existed in my library, I would make sure "Burning Your Boats" is among them. Carter was fantastic at bringing sexual tension and the macabre to the surface of fairy tales and folklore. Overall, this book is a fine investment of both time and money.

I've always considered Angela Carter to be perhaps the best short story writer who ever lived. Gorgeous language, adjective upon adjective, almost purple prose, with such beauty and darkness, that it's almost impossible to believe that anyone can have such command of the English language. I've read this book over and over again, pulling it out periodically to get my Carter fix.

The book is a little uneven towards her later work, but up until the American Ghosts collection, it is almost perfect. Even if it weren't, the book is worth owning if only for Master, The Executioner's Beautiful Daughter, The Fall River Ax Murders, Black Venus, The Tiger's Bride, Puss-in-Boots. Wait. The list of perfect gems in this collection pretty much encompasses everything up to American Ghosts.

Many of these stories are most beautiful read aloud, where the cadence and rhythm of her writing really show themselves.

I wish her novels were as good. Unfortunately, such dense language does not lend itself as well to longer forms and becomes almost oppressive. But the short stories - just beautiful.

"The Satanic Verses" was the fourth of the major Rushdie novels I have read (after "Midnight's Children", "The Moor's Last Sigh" and "The Ground Beneath Her Feet"); and I must admit, it took me two separate goes to complete the work. This fact I attribute to the unevenness of the work -- the narrative disjunctions introduced by Gibreel's dream sequences and the separate fates of Gibreel and Saladin after the airplane explosion. Rushdie exacts quite a bit of patience from the reader as he bounces from Mahound in Jahilia to Titlipur and the Ayesha Haj all the way back to London then on to Bombay, strewing the most diverse of characters throughout the book and finally pulling them all together for a tragi-benedictory finale. Still, patience, in the end, is rewarded, as the story-telling is excellent and the language, as usual, spectacular. This is not a philosophically weighty book, and Rushdie is certainly not a brooding, philosophical man. He is a narrative artist with an incisive eye, an attuned ear, a critical mind and a verbal armory to master any challenge he takes on. Nonetheless, I rate this book number three of the four I have read, after "The Moor's Last Sigh" and "Midnight's Children". In these two, Rushdie is equally brilliant, but more even, more consisent in his development of the overall narrative structure. Still, "The Satanic Verses" is so full and so rich that I might change my ranking if I read it again; and a Rushdie slightly off his stride is still vastly superior to the immaculate output of other, lesser writers. The bumpy ride is worth it, despite the wear and tear on the mental shock-absorbers and the long road to that final scene....

This book is incredible. Rushdie has a unique, lyrical prose style that makes this book a joy to read. The Satanic Verses deals with two men who fall from a hijacked airpane and survive. After the fall, (hmm) they undergo a series of transformations: one man, Gibreel Farishta, is changed into an archangel, while Saladin Chamcha changes into a demon. The story also deals with immigration: the loss of one's homeland and the mistreatment and bigotry with which immigrants are treated. Beyond that, Rushdie is dealing with the intertwined nature of good and evil. Where the book has been accused of blasphemy are the passages in which he opposes the black/white polarization of good and evil in organized religion. I would not recommend this book to a devout Muslim, Catholic, or any unquestioned believer in any dogmatic religion. It questions many beliefs about God and about life. However, I do not feel Rushdie is an atheist, only a believer who does not want to be told what to think. This book is a great masterpiece, second only in Rushdie's catalogue to Midnight's Children. (Well, I haven't read Ground Beneath her Feet yet, but MC is the best I've read so far.) I highly recommend this book and Salman Rushdie. I would read Midnight's Children first if you're a Rushdie newbie.

I freely admit that from among all of the other highly recommended books out there, I chose to read The Verses to see exactly why Rushdie had a price put on his head by Islamic fundamentalists. From a personal level, the book dealt with a variety of complex emotions in a number of interesteing situations and relationships. At a higher level, the book questioned the absoluteness of good and evil as well as the ultimate purpose of religion. And hey, on top of all that the book was quite funny and very entertaining. Saladdin Chamcha was a character I won't soon forget (Spoono, ol' Chamch...). While you needed to keep track of a number of characters in both the real and dream worlds, I thought the writing style was light and easy to follow. I would welcome email from anyone who can fill me in a bit better on the allegories to Islam and why this story was offensive enough to warrant a death sentence for its author.