Style and Technique
In "Good Advice Is Rarer than Rubies," Salman Rushdie crafts a tale that is both straightforward and profound, exploring the ironies of life in Pakistan. The story, centered around two main characters, Muhammad Ali and Miss Rehana, unfolds in a seemingly mundane setting yet offers a magical disruption of the ordinary. Rushdie's unique style, characterized by simplicity and an air of the fantastical, draws the reader into a world where reality and illusion intermingle seamlessly.
Magical Realism in the Everyday
Salman Rushdie is renowned for the literary technique known as Magical Realism, where the extraordinary is woven into the fabric of daily life. This technique allows readers to accept fantastical events as part of the ordinary world. In "Good Advice Is Rarer than Rubies," however, Rushdie departs slightly from his usual style by keeping the events grounded in realism, yet still imbuing them with a subtle, magical quality. This creates a narrative that is both believable and intriguing, leaving the reader to ponder the unseen layers beneath the surface of everyday life.
The Unassuming Narrator
The story is narrated in the third person, closely following the perspective of Muhammad Ali. Ali is portrayed as a man entrenched in a life of corruption and routine, yet his world is shaken by the arrival of Miss Rehana. The narrative unfolds with an irony that challenges perceptions and highlights the transformative power of unexpected encounters. Ali's initial intentions, potentially deceitful, are reconsidered through the lens of a new reality introduced by Miss Rehana's presence. Her enigmatic charm disrupts his daily existence, casting a magical glow over the events that transpire.
A Dance of Dialogue and Setting
Rushdie's writing style in this narrative is marked by its simplicity, enlivened by the dialogue between Muhammad Ali and Miss Rehana. Their exchanges are rendered in a unique blend of Pakistani English, lending authenticity and a distinct sense of place to the story. The minimalistic description of the setting—primarily the gates of the consulate and Ali’s desk—serves to concentrate the reader's focus on the interactions between the characters. This sparseness in detail enhances the story's emotional depth, allowing the dialogue to shine and the characters' development to take center stage.
The Irony of Good Intentions
The narrative intricately explores the theme of good intentions versus societal norms. Muhammad Ali's advice, although well-meaning, is deemed illegal, highlighting the complex interplay between morality and legality. As Miss Rehana ultimately rejects Ali's advice, what initially seems a misfortune transforms into a favorable outcome. This twist leaves both Ali and the reader contemplating the nature of wisdom and the unpredictable paths of destiny. Miss Rehana's departure on the bus echoes a sense of unresolved magic, leaving an indelible mark on Ali’s life.
Through "Good Advice Is Rarer than Rubies," Salman Rushdie masterfully blends realism with a hint of magical disruption. His use of a simplistic narrative style, interlaced with vivid dialogue, invites readers to reflect on the complexities of human interactions and the unexpected ways in which lives intersect and transform. The story challenges the boundaries between reality and illusion, offering a poignant exploration of identity, choice, and the mysterious forces that shape our lives.
Setting
Because one theme of the story concerns how people are happy living in an Eastern environment, the setting is very important. The story takes place outside a British consulate in an unnamed town in India, which establishes a contrast between Eastern and Western culture. Women, accompanied by male family members, arrive at the consulate every Tuesday to obtain permits to immigrate to England to meet their husbands or fiancés. Inside the consulate,...
(This entire section contains 677 words.)
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“sahibs” eat their breakfast while Indian women wait outside in line to see them. “Sahib” is a term Indians used during the Raj period to refer to British rulers, and in this context it indicates the postcolonial setting of the story, where vestiges of old attitudes that privilege British over native people remain. The “coolies” who tie the bedrolls to the top of the bus are as much of a reminder of the caste system in India as the power system established by British rule. Symbolically, the British consulate functions as a site of bureaucracy, while the streets of India represent the business of and vitality of life.
A preponderance of Indian terms lends reality to its culture. Although the area is “dusty,” the bus that transports the women is “brightly painted in multicolored arabesques” and other decorations, giving it a visual charm, especially in contrast to the guarded gates of the consulate. Various stalls outside those gates sell food, including pakoras, a fried, dumpling-like snack filled with curried ingredients. A “bearded lala” wearing a colorful “gold-buttoned khaki uniform with a cockaded turban” guards the gates to the consulate. Muhammad’s office is merely a “low wooden desk in his own special corner of the shanty-town.” Miss Rehana does not wait in line to see him, as women must do in front of the consulate, but instead Muhammad Ali approaches her. Rather than sit on a chair as they talk, Muhammad provides a cushion “on the dusty ground” for her to sit. Near his office is a stall selling “betel-nut,” a mild stimulant popular in India with a tradition dating back thousands of years. Muhammad uses the term “Pukka goods” to describe the authenticity of the passport he will arrange for Miss Rehana. Miss Rehana refers to Muhammad as “old babuji,” a term expressing high respect for a father; and he refers to her as “bibi,” a term of respect for women.
Miss Rehana repeatedly confuses terms of place in England, saying she intends to go to “Bradford, London,” while Muhammad corrects her that London “is a town only, like Multan or Bahawalpur. England is a great nation full of the coldest fish in the world.” His explanation humorously characterizes England as impersonal and boring and reduces the grandness of London to the familiar cities in India. As for the British consulate, Muhammad characterizes it as “a worse place than any police station,” filled with “men with hooded eyes, like hawks,” which directly contrast with Miss Rehana’s eyes, repeatedly described as beautiful. He pleads with Miss Rehana to protect herself from submitting to the bureaucracy of the consulate: “Go home, forget England, only do not go into that building and lose your dignity.” On one hand, this characterization reflects an aspect of Muhammad’s con game in convincing women to accept his help, but on the other it posits England as a Western site that does, indeed, insult Eastern people by treating them as less than fully human. Ironically, here in his office, Muhammad initially tries to trick Miss Rehana as he has done other naive Indian women, acting a bit as a hawk himself. Indeed, Muhammad’s perception of Indian women as gullible marks whom he can swindle prevents a simplistic, romantic portrayal of India as a land of pure innocence and charm. For that reason, just as the bus arrives in a cloud of dust, so it leaves in a dust cloud. What is most important is that Miss Rehana prefers the dust that is India to the kind of life represented by the permit she must obtain in the consulate.
Bibliography
Erickson, John. 1998. Islam and Postcolonial Narrative. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Erickson analyzes the narrative strategies Rushdie and other postcolonial writers use to explore the encounter between Western and Islamic values as well as to discuss the authors’ use of Islam in their fiction.
Gurnah, Abdulrazak, ed. 2007. The Cambridge Companion to Salman Rushdie. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. This collection of essays provides thematic readings as well as detailed interpretations of Rushdie’s work. It also discusses his importance in postcolonial writing.
Reder, Michael, ed. 2000. Conversations With Salman Rusdie. Jackson, MS: University of Mississippi Press. These interesting interviews with Rushdie cover topics such as the fatwa that drove him into hiding as well as literary questions, including the common theme of love and the value of digressions in a narrative.