In
Shalimar the Clown(2005), Salman Rushdie turns to the one remaining thread of his complex cultural inheritance that he has not yet given substantial novelistic treatment: the state of Kashmir. Bombay, Pakistan, London and New York, more or less in that order, have all performed central roles in earlier works. Kashmir, the homeland of Rushdie’s maternal grandfather and one-time favourite location for Rushdie family holidays, had appeared only as a shadowy original for the Valley of K in the children’s fantasy
Haroun and the Sea of Stories(1990), and as the point of departure for Aadam Aziz, cast out of paradise after losing his faith in
Midnight’s Children(1981).
Midnight’s Children is the only novel, pre-Shalimar, to have given Kashmiri politics a more than passing glance. In
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Citation: Teverson, Andrew. "Shalimar The Clown". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 01 December 2005 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=16868, accessed 31 October 2024.]
