Book Review: The Enchantress of Florence by Salman Rushdie

This novel is a fine blend of historical fiction and magical realism, the two genres which seem to be Rushdie’s favorite ways to present his work. Author brings the contemporary towns from the history of east and west together and the historical characters brought to life to tell this tale.

A yellow-haired traveler from Italy visits the court of the Mughal king Akbar and he has a secret to reveal to the king. He claims that he is a blood relative and the son of a sister of Babur (Akbar’s grandfather). While the ministers of Akbar ask the king to ignore the visitor, the king checks this matter with his mother who confirms that Babur  had a sister who was long forgotten and erased from family history for a reason. Akbar lets the visitor to tell the story for which he had come from far away land.

There begins the story of the enchantress, a younger sister of Babur, Qara Koz, the beautiful princess. King Babur had two sisters and the younger one was Qara Koz. Babur after losing a battle at Samarkhand to Shaibani Khan loses his sisters in exchange for his safe return. When Shaibani Khan loses the battle to the King of Persia, Babur’s sisters find a new shelter and thus become a subject of the war and prized possessions of the war's victor. When the King of Persia offers to release the sisters, elder one returns to Babur but Qara Koz remains with the Persian king. When Persian king is defeated by Ottoman Sultan in another war, she follows an Italian army major who was part of the winning side. Then she is led to the fascinating town of Florence. Qara Koz, the enchantress puts her occult skills to good use and mesmerizes the whole town and commands a respect from all the occupants of the town. But that too comes to an end. In a dream, she foresees that a descendant of Babur will become a king of great power the history has not seen yet. She knew she is destined to go back to her family. She ends her life, a symbolic death, only to come back alive after decades.

Image Illustration by Jacqui Oakley

While Akbar listens through the story, he puts his best painter in the kingdom to create the portraits of the forgotten princess and installs them in his palace. As the Italian visitor who has already become a confidant of Akbar (and is no more a visitor) reaches the end of this story, the enchantress comes alive to become a lover of Akbar.

Since this is a work of fiction, Salman Rushdie has created many characters in this novel out of his pen, few incidents may not be historically accurate but that is not the objective of this book anyway. It does not intend to capture the history and describe the persons and places but to see the historical characters as they lived their life, dilemma they went through and make it dramatic to entertain the readers.

I was not convinced with how the novel ends and disapprove the family incest of Akbar with Qara Koz. But the author justifies this saying family incest is common among Camels. That does not explain the matter satisfactorily. My belief is, Akbar was a stronger person than this novel describes, he did not suffer from Oedipus complex either and he would not have said “Until you are not” to Qara Koz like his character in the novel does.

While I am not sure if the enchantress of Florence existed but I find that author is an enchanter for sure. He does not need occult skills but the words he puts together are capable of binding the reader with his books and the story he tells them.

Book Review: Such a long journey by Rohinton Mistry

The novel is set in Mumbai during 1971 in the background of India’s war with Pakistan during liberation of Bangladesh. That incident caused migration of a huge population from Bangladesh to India and Mumbai too witnessed a fair share of refugees in the town. Even though the novel touches upon many sensitive subjects (and was withdrawn from Mumbai University's syllabus), it is mainly the story of Gustad Noble, a member of Parsi community living in Mumbai, his family, friends and other residents of Khodadad Building.

Gustad Noble, is a hard working bank clerk, a devoted family man, had gone through the hardships of life in his upbringing. He wishes that the life of his children will be better than his. But his promising son who got admission into a IIT refuses to join there instead expresses interests in the Arts course. His loving daughter falls ill. These developments make Gustad sad. A letter puts into him motion again which was sent by his friend, Major Jimmy Billimoria, an ex-army man who had joined RAW, a secret service reporting to Prime Minister of India. The letter asks to collect money from one of the RAW agents and put it into the hands of rebels fighting for separation of Bangladesh. He initially finds it interesting to do the task but when he tries to back out at the second thought, he receives a threat note. He feels he is deceived by his friend who he considered as elder brother. Being drawn into this dangerous plot, with the help of an associate at Bank, he puts Major Jimmy’s money transfer plan. But the fear of getting caught burns him and it takes out the peace and calm out of his life.

Top Right: Rohinton Mistry; Bottom Right: A still from movie adoption of the book

It turns out that Major Jimmy had had a different plan of diverting some of the funds from the operation he is working on for personal objectives. He is not happy working for the then Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi who had used RAW for her personal motives, to keep a check on her political enemies. (This novel describes the functioning style of Indira Gandhi without naming her). Government officials discover the plan of Major Jimmy, take him into custody and torture him to recover the funds. Gustad meets his friend Jimmy on his deathbed and is asked to forgive him for his inability to be transparent in what happened. Gustad realizes how things turned out and later reads in a newspaper that his friend, Major Jimmy is no more. An associate of Major Billy at RAW vows to avenge this accusing the son of PM Sanjay for what had happened. Gustad wonders about the impermanence of the life.

Such a long journey is indeed a long journey for the reader too (and boring in between as well). It is very rich in the details of characters and the places and effectively transfers the sad feeling to its readers. Though all the pages of this lengthy novel were not required for central plot of the novel, they provide literary dimensions to the book and make it long lasting.

This is the second book of Rohinton Mistry, first published in 1991. It was shortlisted for Booker prize and won the Commonwealth Writers Prize for the author.

Book Review: Tales of Fosterganj by Ruskin Bond

This book is about the early years of author attempting to be a writer, finding home at Fosterganj, a hamlet on the outskirts of Mussoorie. Tiny population lives there, little happens in a day and for an outsider life appears to have come to a standstill. But the author gets drawn into a series of unusual adventures, a close encounter with a leopard, getting locked inside a haunted place, expedition into the mountains in search of lizards and so on. Though he calls this book a work of fiction, it is his reminiscences as a struggling writer during 1960’s. He lived his memories again and produced this compelling short book with his usual light touch.

Ruskin Bond at Mussoorie

When I had read Ruskin Bond last time (Book: Roads to Mussoorie), I was sure of reading Bond again and also of visiting Mussorie when the opportunity arrived and it did last week. When I was set to go to Mussoorie, I picked this book. It was a lifetime experience, reading Bond and watching the sunset at Mussoorie amid the fascinating clouds trapped in the mountains standing tall at an altitude of 6500 feet.

If you enjoy solitude, you are sure to love Ruskin Bond and you will be drawn to mountains and non-materialistic side of life.

An evening at Mussoorie

Book Review: A Hole at the Bottom of the Sea by Joel Achenbach

This book is about the environmental disaster that happened in 2010 which popularly came to be known as ‘BP oil spill’. It was a technological crisis, geological calculations going wrong, a crisis no one saw coming. Risks of offshore drilling were well known to the oil & gas industry and deep-water drilling for oil was already decades old. While the man appeared to have mastered the art, nature proved him wrong. The tragic explosion on the huge drilling rig appeared to be a manageable accident initially but the oil gushing to the shores and the efforts to plug the hole going in vain only helped the spread of spill, dolphins and other marine life continued to die in record numbers. It was not just a leak in the oil well; the explosion had opened the river stream of hydrocarbons into the ocean. A classic industrial accident turned out to be an environmental crisis, politically sensational and daily news on the media which general public tracked with concern.

It took hundreds of engineers, scientists working together for months, use of remotely operated vehicles in the deep sea, engineers choreographing robotic ballets, pouring miles of cement to seal the well in order to contain the spill. BP had to face criminal charges and this crisis had cost the company $42.2 billion. The total oil discharge was estimated at 4.9 million barrels.

This book effectively brings out the irony that we are inhabitants of a planet that is becoming increasingly engineered. Off-shore drilling is embedding a complex engineered system with complex geological systems of nature. The industry learned its lessons from the crisis and there is no retreat from deep water technology. While technological advancements come there will be incidents of ‘frog in the boiling water’ too. (If you do not know the story here it is: There is a frog sitting in a pan of cold water that is gradually brought to a boil. The frog never realizes the time has to come to jump to safety. Result: boiled frog).

Author of this book, Joel Achenbach is a journalist and a regular contributor to National Geographic. In this book, he looks behind the scene, brings out the human story in the technological crisis.

Book Review: Countdown by Amitav Ghosh

This is a non-fiction by Amitav Ghosh, first published in 1999, after India tested out the nuclear devices near Pokhran. Media published the event as a great advancement for India and announced its time has arrived. Many thought of nuclear bomb as more than a weapon, it may not be used stop small wars but it can avoid a big one and can bring influence in the global pecking order where India is suppressed for long, from colonial times. Few disagree with it and think nuclearization is a threat and if put to wrong to use it can hurt lives of millions.

Amitav travels to Pokhran to learn what the natives think of it and to see the effects of the nuclear explosion in first person. He arrives at Delhi to meet with George Fernandes, the then defense minister who was a critical of nuclear weapons, but made a decision for India go ahead with the tests. George thought five nations who possess nuclear weapons cannot say to rest of the rest world how to behave. Author along with a group of journalists travels to Kashmir along with the defense minister where he gets to meet with defense personnel and know their opinions on the nuclear weaponry.

He then travels to Pakistan, meets a religious group head, a Govt. official, social activists, and many journalists to get their side of opinion. A religious head opines that in the event of a war, there is always a threat that nuclear weapon would be used. During the discussions it comes out that Kashmir is not the principal problem between India and Pakistan. Though both sides are not determined to resolve the issue, but even if it is solved, other issues would take center stage. Water sharing would become an issue; trade may suffer for any reason. A Muslim being mistreated in India can trigger protests and violation in Pakistan and vice versa.

The author later explores the damage caused by the use of a nuclear weapon and its impact on the social life, immediately and in the times to come. He references a study made by M V Ramanna (Bombing Bombay?: http://www.ippnw.org/pdf/Bombay.pdf). He concludes that nuclear programs of both India and Pakistan are more status driven and not threat driven. But for this pride, they will have to run the risk of nuclear accidents, war and the casualties they bring.

This is a small book (84 pages long); a quick read and the situations led to writing of this book have gone through a cycle to come up again now. While the world is more aware of the damages after the accident at nuclear power plant in Japan, disarmament is still a distant dream. If Ukraine had its nukes, did Russia dared to annex Crimea? I suppose this thought itself would make Governments pump more money into nuclear programs.