Shalimar the Clown by Salman Rushdie
"Shalimar the Clown" is a novel by Salman Rushdie that intricately weaves together personal and political narratives set against the backdrop of Kashmir's tumultuous history. The story revolves around key characters including Max Ophuls, a charismatic former French Resistance hero and U.S. ambassador to India, and Boonyi, a young Kashmiri dancer whose tumultuous relationship with Max leads to her disgrace. The novel explores the transformation of Noman Sher Noman, Boonyi's husband, from a beloved entertainer to a violent terrorist, shaped by the fallout of their affair.
As the narrative unfolds, it delves into the complex socio-political landscape of Kashmir, where diverse communities have historically coexisted, and examines the impact of global conflicts, such as World War II and the Soviet-Afghan War. Rushdie's storytelling is marked by a blend of magical realism, humor, and a deep cultural sensitivity, reflecting on themes of identity, betrayal, and the intersections of personal and collective histories. The novel is rich in supporting characters, each adding layers to the intricate tapestry of the narrative, resulting in a multifaceted exploration of love, violence, and the shared human experience across different cultures and time periods.
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Shalimar the Clown by Salman Rushdie
Excerpted from an article in Magill’s Survey of World Literature, Revised Edition
First published: 2005
Type of work: Novel
The Work
At the center of Shalimar the Clown are Max Ophuls, “one of the architects of the postwar world,” a charismatic, larger than life former hero of the French Resistance in World War II, the United States’ ambassador to India, head of the American effort to support the mujahadeen during the Soviet Union’s war in Afghanistan, and world-renowned power broker; Boonyi, the beautiful young Kashmiri dancer he seduces and abandons, who returns to her village in disgrace; Noman Sher Noman (alias Shalimar), Boonyi’s childhood sweetheart and husband, who is transformed from a popular entertainer into a terrorist and murderer by their affair; and Max and Boonyi’s illegitimate daughter, India, who is raised by Max and his wife and living in Los Angeles when the story begins. The typically rich and eccentric supporting cast includes Olga Volga (“the last surviving descendant of the legendary potato witches of Astrakhan”), Firdaus Begum Noman (Shalimar’s mother, a snake sorceress), the “Iron Mullah” (a Muslim terrorist leader), Colonel Kachhwaha (leader of the Indian armed forces in Kashmir), a Gujar prophetess, a Filipino terrorist leader, and an Indian film star.
On the second page readers learn that “the ambassador was slaughtered on [India’s] doorstep like a halal chicken dinner, bleeding to death from a deep neck wound caused by a single slash of the assassin’s blade.” Over the next 394 pages readers learn why, how, and by whom. To answer these questions, Rushdie takes his readers to Kashmir, the novel’s paradise lost, and the idyllic village of Pachigam, where Hindus, Muslims, and Jews have lived for centuries in peace; to the Indian army and Muslim terrorist camps, where the forces that will tear Kashmir and Pachigam apart are trained, equipped, and ideologically indoctrinated; to World War II France, where the Resistance fights another occupying power through an insurgency of its own; and to polyglot Los Angeles, where race riots erupt in the streets.
“Everywhere was now a part of everywhere else,” Rushdie has his character, India, think. “Russia, America, London, Kashmir. Our lives, our stories, flowed into one another’s, were no longer our own, individual, discrete. This unsettled people. There were collisions and explosions.” There are also murders, rapes, and decapitations; family curses and a flying man; love affairs and betrayals; media frenzies, a televised trial, a “sorcerer’s defense,” and a prison break; puns, pop culture references, and loving descriptions of Kashmiri culture; Magical Realism and vivid attention to the actualities of the distant and near-at-hand; and fiction, history, and fictional history. In other words, the mixture of comedy, seriousness of purpose, and multicultural imagination that are exactly what readers have come to expect from the fiction of Salman Rushdie.
Review Sources
Booklist 101, nos. 19/20 (June 1, 2005): 1713.
Kirkus Reviews 73, no. 11 (June 1, 2005): 608.
The Nation 281, no. 10 (October 3, 2005): 28-32.
The New York Review of Books 52, no. 15 (October 6, 2005): 8-11.
The New York Times 154 (September 6, 2005): E1-E7.
The New York Times Book Review 155 (October 23, 2005): 16.
The New Yorker 81, no. 26 (September 5, 2005): 152-155.
Publishers Weekly 252, no. 29 (July 25, 2005): 39.
The Wall Street Journal, September 9, 2005, p. W6.