[caleb72]

OK - finally finished. Really enjoyed this book. I was lost on a lot of things and having now read through the comments, I can certainly relate a feeling of confusion at times, and not being sure really what Rushdie was getting at.

However, it was a lovely book. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. It's not my first Rushdie and the other books I've read have left me feeling similarly content.

The end of the story was magnificent with Saladin Chamcha and his father - and the lamp. Oooh wonderful!

In the blurb on the back of my book, it mentions a parallel with Gulliver's Travels and that has a ring of truth to it for me. I would add to that the rather absurd The Adventures of Baron Munchausen.

What I got from it?

I definitely responded to the nature of good and evil. I didn't so much feel the metamorphosis, possibly because I already found myself taking the Ovid view that the change was not the change. Which is why the story ended like it did.

However, I just adored all the links Al-lat with Alleluia, Gibreel with - well Gibreel, the two significant planes Bostan and Gulistan. Gibreel and Saladin were ejected from one garden after leaving home and Saladin was carried home in the other. Sisodia as someone but I don't know who. His convenient appearances are even remarked on at the end of the book. And the stories... loved them.

Also, I'm not sure if there is significance is the fact that there are two Ayeshas, two Hinds and two Mishals. I also wonder if the believer turned cynic Salman is intentionally named thusly.

It was interesting seeing the differences in conflict in London versus Bombay with the main religious heavyweights belting it out in India, whereas race is the major divide in London. In both places, you notice Saladin ends up with an activist - almost to show their mirror-like relationship to Saladin. Pamela was London to Saladin, whereas Zeeny Vakil could very well have represented India.

What Rushdie was saying about religion is possibly hard to say. He has had his own religious history, starting Muslim, becoming an atheist, implying that he'd reverted, retracted the reversion.

I'm still thinking that Salman in the story is a bit close though don't you think?

Anyway - this is my usual erratic drivel to start off my discussion. Really enjoyed this book. Gave it 4 stars.

EDIT: I think I posted this late and night - repetition, poor expression. I'm beginning to think I need to hire an editor for my forum posts.