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A review by dingakaa
The Moor's Last Sigh by Salman Rushdie
5.0
Salman Rushdie is far and away my favourite author; I have loved every publication of his that I have read. The consistent excellence throughout the entire reading experience has caused me to rave to anyone who will listen about his work. The Moor's Last Sigh is no exception. Granted, much of my opinion about his writing is due to subjective attraction to his particular brand of excellence, but it is excellence nonetheless.
Rushdie employs his characteristic pace and stream-of-consciousness cadence with a precision one wouldn't expect from such a free-flowing style. Within this approach, he still manages a wit and emotion that defy belief in their sophistication. The breadth of plot delivers a tragedy to make one weep, both at the personal stories it tells, and the political history it uses to convey these stories. A master of both history and geopolitics, Rushdie manages to both thrill on a literal level, and with the undercurrent of acute commentary throughout his writing.
A warning to prospective readers: this book takes work. The combination of pace, references, side-stories, and sheer emotion take energy, and this is if you love Rushdie.
SPOILERS TO FOLLOW
I have one point of contention: the Uma story. We first hear of her before she enters the story, when Moraes is a teenager, as a way to explain that his twisted fling with a tutor was nothing compared to what Uma would be to him in future pages. In the latter half of the book --after Uma has passed through-- Rushdie spends lots of time depicting her devastating impact on Moraes' emotions and his family. This character is central to the story and protagonist; her ruination of both Moraes' and the Zogoiby family affect every part of the story. And yet, she gets very little "screen time" in terms of pages. I was so prepared for her appearance, and continued to read about her effect after she died, that I was disappointed by how little I got to read about her actual interactions with Moraes. It's as if there wasn't enough meat on the bone. I needed ten to twenty more pages of Uma.
Rushdie employs his characteristic pace and stream-of-consciousness cadence with a precision one wouldn't expect from such a free-flowing style. Within this approach, he still manages a wit and emotion that defy belief in their sophistication. The breadth of plot delivers a tragedy to make one weep, both at the personal stories it tells, and the political history it uses to convey these stories. A master of both history and geopolitics, Rushdie manages to both thrill on a literal level, and with the undercurrent of acute commentary throughout his writing.
A warning to prospective readers: this book takes work. The combination of pace, references, side-stories, and sheer emotion take energy, and this is if you love Rushdie.
SPOILERS TO FOLLOW
I have one point of contention: the Uma story. We first hear of her before she enters the story, when Moraes is a teenager, as a way to explain that his twisted fling with a tutor was nothing compared to what Uma would be to him in future pages. In the latter half of the book --after Uma has passed through-- Rushdie spends lots of time depicting her devastating impact on Moraes' emotions and his family. This character is central to the story and protagonist; her ruination of both Moraes' and the Zogoiby family affect every part of the story. And yet, she gets very little "screen time" in terms of pages. I was so prepared for her appearance, and continued to read about her effect after she died, that I was disappointed by how little I got to read about her actual interactions with Moraes. It's as if there wasn't enough meat on the bone. I needed ten to twenty more pages of Uma.