For the true voracious reader, there’s no better pleasure than discovering a new author, especially one with a sizeable back catalogue to dig into, and especially one who’s still writing!
This past week, I read The Ground Beneath Her Feet by Salman Rushdie and made just such a discovery. He reminds me of my favorite authors who are non-native English speakers, like Nabokov and Garcia Marquez, who seem so infatuated with the English language and its rich intricacies. And like Marilynne Robinson, there are sentences of Rushdie’s that are so lovely and complex and witty, that I have to read them slowly enough to fully savor them.
So I’ll be taking another Rushdie book, Midnight’s Children, on an upcoming long flight, and if I enjoy that one as much as Feet, then I’ll try working my way back through all his titles. All I knew of him came from the furor over The Satanic Verses, but since I was only ten or so when the book came out, I never read any of his work. Also, my academic training is in American Studies, so I’ve had to make a conscious effort to broaden my literary scope.
Midnight’s Children is phenomenal, but so is Shame, which nobody every talks about these days. It was the only book I had with me when I was trekking in Nepal, but it was OK, because each sentences was so great I had to read it twice, so it took me a long time to read. Haven’t been so interested in much of what’s come later, though.
I’m glad to hear such good things about Midnight’s Children! I love taking new books and music on trips with me and having them become interwoven with my memories of the trips. I’ll wish-list Shame too, and I want to also read Satanic Verses.
Midnight’s Children is one of my favorite books of all time. I think I’ll follow your lead and read his other titles as well!
Anjali, it’s pretty amazing– I still have a hundred or so pages to go, but it’s just dazzling. I can highly recommend “Beneath Her Feet” and a few MC characters even pop up!