The Enchantress of Florence

The Enchantress of Florence by Salman Rushdie (fiction, 349 pages, publication date June 3, 2008 )

In Salman Rushdie’s new novel, The Enchantress of Florence, a historical adventure set in the Mughal empire and Renaissance Florence, a mysterious blond stranger arrives at the court of Akbar the Great with a secret that is cursed for all but the emperor’s ears–the story of Qara Köz, the hidden princess, who left India and traveled to Florence and beyond. Rushdie warns the reader up front that this will not be a straightforward narrative:

The traveler had money in his pocket and had made a long, roundabout journey. This way was his way: to move toward his goal indirectly, with many detours and divagations. (The Enchantress of Florence, page 10)

and indeed, the story works back and forth between settings and time periods, with the narrative folding upon itself in many ways. Characters in one location or time have mirrors in another (and Qara Köz has her own Mirror who travels with her), events and phrases occur and recur, and questions of religion and identity and truth are brought up again and again. At its heart, The Enchantress of Florence is about the power of story.

Rushdie put years of research into this book (those interested in learning more can peruse his long bibliography, which he claims is not a complete list of books he consulted), and much of the background of the story has firm pinnings in historical fact. Akbar was a real emperor, who tried to embrace all religions and encouraged philosophical thought. Machiavelli is also a main character, and Lorenzo di Medici, Vlad the Impaler, and Queen Elizabeth I all make appearances. For the most part, Rushdie works these figures, and much of his research, organically into the story.

The Enchantress of Florence is out now in England, and reviews are decidedly mixed. I liked it for its adventure/historical novel/Rushdie-ness, and as always with Rushdie, it left me with quite a bit to think about. I’ve been reading some interesting takes on religion lately (primarily in Purple Hibiscus and Fieldwork), and this just adds to the mix.

It’s not a book I would recommend whole-heartedly, because it’s not going to appeal to those who have no patience with post-modernism in general or with Rushdie in particular, or with magical realism. Also, and I think this is typical of Rushdie, even in a book where the title character is a woman, it’s all about the men. The female characters have no existence without the men (one of them literally so–she was imagined into life by a man), nor, it seems, do they want to. Akbar’s explorations of religion and humanity and goodness will earn Rushdie no currency with those who already condemn him:

If there had never been a God, the emperor thought, it might have been easier to work out what goodness was. This business of worship, of the abnegation of self in the face of the Almighty, was a distraction, a false trail. Wherever goodness lay, it did not lie in ritual, unthinking obeisance before a deity but rather, perhaps, in the slow, clumsy, error-strewn working out of an individual or collective path. (The Enchantress of Florence, page 310)

However, it’s this questioning, this reaching and searching that elevates the tale above the adventure, and will stay in the reader’s mind long after the story itself has faded.