Rushdie, Salman. 1999. The Ground Beneath Her Feet. New York: Holt. Reviewed 02 June 1999
Why, then, bother with it at all? Not just "because it's there," but because, like Gravity's Rainbow (a far better book at
One could, perhaps, call this book an alternate history, postulating as it does a just slightly
askew present world. Unfortunately, the alternate references were not really necessary to the
story; often they were (at best) distractions, particularly given the artiness. Or should I say
popculturiness, since the unifying plot element is pop music? Further, unlike the traditional
speculative fiction version of alternate history, trying to identify the diversion point (or even general locus) is futile. There are three or four candidates; I ruled out a couple (red herrings
at best), and another review claims to have ruled out another. Further, there is no spirit of
"what if" in Rushdie's work, only "this is." That is a description, not a criticism. One is
reminded of Disch's On
Wings of Song ( Another possibility is "magical realism." Some of Rushdie's other work is of that school. But The Ground Beneath Her Feet is not. Magical realism, as I understand the term, has an inescapable political element, even at the personal level. The Ground Beneath Her Feet doesn't so much deny the political as ignore it, except when the opportunity arises to subtly criticize certain political figures unlikely to be familiar to Americans. This criticism, however, almost seems a spot of lavender in a seascapeone must look very close to find it, and then one must ask "why?" I won't bore you with other theories about this book. It will, no doubt, be part of the "literary fiction" discussion for several years. It is far from Rushdie's best work; neither is it an effort to be ashamed of. Rather, The Ground Beneath Her Feet seems to be like the Michaelson-Morley experiments. It's virtually impossible to prove the absence of something. Rushdie has gone a long way to "prove the absence" of externally consistent referents as a requirement for a literary novel. It is, in that sense, an important (but failed) experiment. Nothing more, and nothing less. In the end, Rushdie's novel fails Le Guin's test: The morning after finishing this 500-page tome, it's difficult to recall the names of the major characters. (It's also difficult to remember any of the plot, but that seems a part of the book's purpose.) One never feels that the author cares about any of the characters. However beautiful the writing, it isn't fiction. It's just writing.
Overall rating:
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