Midnight's Children (Vintage 21st Anniv Editions) [ペーパーバック]

今インドに駐在していて、仕事の関係上パキスタンにもよく行きます。この両国、パキスタンの独立以降ずうっといがみあっているのですが、ラシュディ先生の世界的なデビュー作であるこの小説を読んでいると、その二つの国、民族、宗教の対立、擦れ合いが背後から音を立てて迫って来るような感じがします。他の作品でもそうなのですが、先生は「人の悩み、悲しみ」を描くと言うより、「人類、民族の悩み、悲しみ」を鮮やかに浮き彫りにしてくれます。これまで余り好きになれなかったインドの人々のことが、少し分かったような気がしました。インド独立の日に生まれた子供達に不思議な力が与えられ、色んな目に会いながらインド亜大陸を飛び回るお話です。読みこなすにはちょっと骨が折れますが、メゲないダメ男君である主人公とその妹の二人が最高に愛すべきキャラクターで、暗く重くなっても仕方ないテーマであるにも係わらず、最後まで生き生きとしたストーリーになっています。インドに興味のある方にとっては必読の書、と言って良いのではないでしょうか。

　疑いようのない傑作です。
　インド独立と同時に生を受けた主人公の半生を軸にした物語なのですが、露骨に寓喩的な設定にもかかわらず、逸話、メタファーの氾濫でそんなことは忘れてしまいます。
　インドとパキスタンの現代史を背景に、主人公の周囲で超自然的で・一見荒唐無稽な事件が続き、それらを通して、強烈な風刺、アレゴリーが綯交ぜになって読む者の心を揺さぶります。まさに、マジックリアリズムの名手であるラシュディの面目躍如といったところ。プロットもすばらしく、また決して明るい内容の物語ではないにもかかわらず、コメディタッチの語り口は、非常にentertainingでもあります。
　とかく「悪魔の詩」のイメージが強いラシュディですが、これを読んで現代文学における最高の書き手の一人であることを確認。

This review essentially deals with the author Salman Rushdie rather than this book, because after all Midnight's Children is the 'Booker of Bookers', what more can one add? - except to state that if you are preoccupied with 'magic' then you have spectacularly missed the point of this book. The allegorical nature of its construction, its metaphors and its historical dramas are what is important here; its allusions and not any apparent wizardry. As my title said, this most certainly is not Harry Potter for readers and I wish reviewers would stop wasting their words on that topic and instead re-read and re-examine the core themes, dramas and constructs of what is undoubtedly one of the greatest books ever written.

Salman Rushdie is to Literature, what George W. Bush was to American politics. Seldom has history witnessed individuals who possess such an ability to thoroughly polarize their respective audiences. Love or loathe, there can be nothing in between. For reference, my feet are firmly on the 'love' side of the divide.

In continuum, one thing I personally find fascinating about Rushdie is his ability to alienate people in equal numbers to those he utterly enthralls. As per the aforementioned correlation there are those that he utterly repulses and repels and that fascinates me. What is the reason for this? It is fair to say that, that which we are able to 'read' (and by read I mean in the Mortimer Aldler sense of the word), is a direct reflection of our own intellect or lack thereof, and I sincerely believe that this is one reason why Rushdie irritates so many people. He irritates people because most people are not that bright and are not really 'readers'; not actually literate per se. What I mean by that last comment is that people no longer seem able to concentrate on a book (or much else besides television), or to dig for deeper meaning; to read between the lines and to grasp allegory and metaphorical allusions. In today's world of get-rich-quick everyone wants to be Eric Clapton but no one wants to put in the hours, henceforth people buy 'Guitar Hero'. Life is not a game of 'Guitar Hero'.

It's interesting to draw parallels between Rushdie and another English author, Stephen Fry. Fry is also an intellectual heavyweight with a wonderfully sharp and agile brain and an extensive vocabulary. Unlike Rushdie, however, Fry is big and cuddly, has round edges and not sharp corners and I think that is one reason why the public take to him more easily. Besides which he is also flawed and slightly imperfect; he reaches out to us where Rushdie pulls away. To Fry's non-threatening modelling-clay persona Rushdie is perfect, unforgiving and cold, a statuesque individual carved from the hardest granite. One can't also help but feel that perhaps Rushdie's ethnicity rubs people up the wrong way, or is that just a cheap shot on my part and merely an easy way to find an answer to my question? One cannot help but wonder, though, if it isn't hard for those outside the liberal Literary establishment to accept a man of colour is more brilliant, better educated and ore mellifluous than they could ever hope to be. Again, that might just be smoke-and-mirrors, a cheap shot on my behalf, a quick-fix to a more complex quandary.

To return to my second paragraph, I personally adore the fact that I have to read Rushdie with a green highlighter in hand (green is my colour for unknown words). I adore the fact that Rushdie crushes my ego, and belittles my vocabulary. I love the fact he challenges me to become a better reader to widen my vocabulary. I love the fact that Cambridge-educated Rushdie has a higher intellect than I, because he is SUPPOSED to have. An author (like any artiste) should ideally not be an everyman, should not be a Stephen King or a Jeffery Archer. Authors of Literature should shoulder the responsibility of raising the bar and challenging our collective consciousness, and Rushdie relishes that opportunity and performs that r'le admirably, a perfect casting.

If you don't get the beauty and elegance of this book, then you simply have not understood it and I sincerely urge you re-read it, preferably with a green highlighter in hand!