high opinion of Rian Malan's traitor's heart, interesting about Bruce Chatwin, philosophical and literary, too much so for the frame of mind i'm in nowadays - makes me yearn for pugilistic hitchens and the brilliant brevity of nabokov

will probably not read everything in this at once so it will stay on the reading shelf for a while

must read a rushdie novel at some point, though - if only to slake the thirst for a close-up view of bombay/mumbai and india

His 1982 essay 'The New Empire Within Britain' is one of the best pieces I have read on racism in the UK. His idea is that British attitudes to the various peoples of the empire found a new domestic home and focus in its society and government's attitudes towards Caribbean and South Asian migrants in the post-war period.

'The Pink Conqueror crept home, shrank back on their grey island and into the narrow horizons of their pallid, drizzled streets.' - the benefit of Rushdie’s rich grasp of language crossing over into essay form.

'For the citizens of the new, imported Empire, for the colonized Asians and blacks of Britain, the police force represents that colonizing army, those regiments of occupation and control.' Home Office today.

'There were policemen at a Southall demonstration who sat in their vans, writing the letters NF in the steam of their breath on the windows.' Since then… Stephen Lawrence and Jean Charles de Menezes cases and continuous institutional racism and sexism.

'Meanwhile, the stereotyping goes on. Blacks have rhythm, Asians work hard. I've been told by Tory politicians that the Conservative Party seriously discusses the idea of wooing the Asians and leaving the Afro-Caribbeans to the Labour Party, because Asians are such good capitalists. In the new Empire, as in the old one, it seems our masters are willing to use the tried and trusted strategies of divide-and-rule.'

'And until you, the whites, see that the issue is not integration, or harmony, or multiculturalism, or immigration, but simply the business of facing up to and eradication the prejudices within almost all of you, the citizens of your new, and last, Empire will be obliged to struggle against you.'

I’d say it’s worth reading. This book has a collection of similarly interesting essays :)

4.5 stars

a nice literary guacamole into which I happily dip the tortilla chip of my curiosity

Het essay is uitgevonden om er een boek als dit mee te kunnen vullen. Vraag me waarom ik van boeken hou, en ik citeer Rushdie in Is nothing sacred?, de ultieme liefdesverklaring aan de literatuur. Een van de vele prachtige essays in dit boek.

it was very deep yet dispersed in its kind. i like the imagery he puts into framing his words as well as the mesage it gives. the idea of bombay is finely picturised in this book

The idea of Imaginary Homelands is that of a commentary documenting different living conditions in various parts of our world, looking at each continent from its writer's construct. 'Outside the Whale' is a brilliant complete critical essay. Occasional honest remarks in Salman Rushdie's excellent writing keep the reader interested.
For the essay refer here:
Outside the Whale

#8.6
I come to think of Bruce's unwritten book as the burden he's been carrying all his writing life. Once he's done this, I think, he'll be free, he'll be able to take flight in all sorts of directions.

#9.9
One cannot know whether Wilhelm Grimm made it up, or whether he found it growing like a mushroom in the forest when he went gathering fictions with his brother.

4,5

More reviewing and less polemic than the later collection. Masterful short pieces on Heinrich Boll, Graham Greene, Richard Ford and Raymond Carver. ('Carver was a great writer. Read everything Carver wrote.')

haven't read it yet
tell me your thoughts if you have read it

Imaginary Homelands: Essays and Criticism 1981-1991 by Salman Rushdie: this is an excellent collection of mostly short pieces about a variety of subjects. From politics to religion to literature, Rushdie is well informed and opinionated. I found him particularly good on Islam and India. This kind of book is great for the gym or train, since most of the pieces are quite short. Two of the last pieces give his perspective on the fatwa that turned his life upside down after the publication of The Satanic Versus. I was intrigued to see that he regrets delaying the paperback publication version for three years as a concession to the Islamic radicals (I remember waiting for the paperback version so I could see what it was all about).

I read "Commonwealth Literature Does Not Exist," "Hobson-Jobson," "Is Nothing Sacred?" and "Why I have Embraced Islam." I must say, I actually prefer reading Rushdie's essays to reading his fiction. His narrative voice is more pleasant to me when it's in an essay.

Thoughts on each essay:
"Commonwealth Literature Does Not Exist"
Nicely coincides with my recent obsession with the idea of strategic essentialism. Like, in the fifth paragraph Rushdie says it's weird how there's "a school of literature whose supposed members deny vehemently that they belong to it." And then later he suggests that the disempowered or "colonized" peoples are remaking English itself. He talks about how "Commonwealth literature" is a category which narrows "English literature" to be "something topographical, nationalistic, possibly even racially segregationist" and how it's divisive. He's a big proponent of a universal community of writers. And he makes a good case for it. Examples? Rushdie himself was born in India and wrote about Pakistan from England, which he cites as evidence for "the folly of trying to contain writers inside passports." He ends by saying that "Commonwealth literature" should not exist. But that "even ghosts can be made to exist if you set up enough faculties, if you write enough books and appoint enough research students." Well said, sir.

"Hobson-Jobson"
Evidence for that whole remaking of English thing? I don't know what his point was, really.

"Is Nothing Sacred?"
Love it. Rushdie definitely won over the book-lover in me for the way he clearly loves the written word. And how did that make me love him? Because of the way he talks about kissing books. And describes novels as "the form created to discuss the fragmentation of truth." And likens the author's role to something religious("It is for art to capture that [mystical] experience, to offer it to, in the case of literature, its readers; to be, for a secular, materialist culture, some sort of replacement for what the love of god offers in the world of faith.") only to revoke that "sacralizing" of literature a couple of pages later. And then, of course, there is that awesome description of life as a house. Which ties up the speech/essay with an extended metaphor for the importance of literature: "Literature is the one place in any society where, within the secrecy of our own heads, we can hear voices talking about everything in every possible way ." Yes.

"Why I Have Embraced Islam"
I don't think he actually answers the question in this title. Or maybe I was just overwhelmed/confused/slightly upset with the retraction of the atheism which was so fundamental to the voice I fell in love with in "Is Nothing Sacred?" That said, it was interesting still. And I definitely respect his eloquence in describing the intent behind what he wrote and how he now feels about it. And the way he shared his experience with Islam. This essay definitely offers interesting context for Rushdie's controversial Satanic Verses. And insight into how authors' perspectives on their own words shifts and reflects/reacts to public opinion.

Overall: ambivalence? I liked (read: agreed with) much of what Rushdie wrote. When I understood (read: could relate to) what Rushdie was saying, I appreciated it. But he has a way of seeming to write from somewhere that I can't quite understand. Like maybe he's withholding or suppressing some anger? I don't know, there's just something which pushes me away even as I want to love him. Maybe that I don't actually like his fiction much? Or maybe they're both just part of that same undefinable undercurrent.