Human Fallibility and Religion

I hit a roadblock when I ran into the Rushdie book. The Satanic Verses is one of the densest books I have ever read, and I already read fairly slowly. I still haven't finished it, so I feel a little guilty about posting on it, but I've run into plenty of intriguing things and have lots to tell you.

First of all, I love Rushdie's style: making up words, pushing real words together, adding words where they don't make literal sense, all to add to the lyrical flow of his prose so that the book ends up having a poetic quality. Using poetry allows him to cram more meaning into each word, resulting in one very dense read. But this density is a good thing in my opinion. I like books with lots of meaning, and it's good to not always understand everything the author is trying to say. I think I could read this book many times and still not grasp all the meanings in it. The depth adds a mysterious dimension to the story, which is important for the book's themes. I think mysterious things appeal to me in many parts of life; they prevent boredom.

My favorite part so far is Gibreel's experiences with Doña Rosa. I think it is fascinating that Rosa can make Gibreel feel physical pain just by the force of her will. And there are so many parts of this narrative that I don't understand. Will Gibreel continue to be oppressed by her ghost? What is the purpose of her story? It seems that it may comment on our ability to reshape our own memories. When Rosa is dying, she "tossed on her bed, did-she-didn't-she, making the last version of the story of her life, unable to decide what she wanted to be true." Does this relate to a theme of this book? Do humans make up the important parts of their lives and their faiths in order to comfort themselves? Has absolute truth lost its meaning and importance?

Another interesting aspect of the book for me was Rushdie's decision to make Gibreel into an angel and Chamcha into Satan. Both characters' morals fit somewhere in the gray area between good and evil, and neither seems more angelic than the other. I speculate that Rushdie characterized these two as he did to prove a point, because, as we've said in discussions, an author like Rushdie who plans out so many aspects of his story doesn't make a decision like this by chance. I think he wants to point out that it is more luck and chance that determine whether a person is considered good or evil.

Moral relativity and human fallibility are important themes of this book. I have to say that in many ways, I agree with Rushdie and this book has interested me a lot more in religion. Even though I have a reasonable background in religion from Catholic school, I know it's very biased, so I think I'm going to try to learn more about religion and maybe take a class or two while I'm here. I need to know more before I could even begin to judge, and I probably shouldn't judge as much as I do.