#100: Midnight's Children (8)

From litlovers.com: "Midnight's Children is a novel about India, and attempts to map the modern Indian mind, with all its contradictions. How much difficulty have you had in addressing the novel from a Western perspective? Is there an 'otherness' which makes it hard to assimilate, or are the novel's concerns universal and easily understood?"

I have completed Midnight's Children. I enjoyed the book, especially the varied ways Rushdie wrote and told the story, and overall found the story interesting. But I also found little meaning within it. I do not blame the character, who feared absurdity, but rather my lack of knowledge about the trials and tribulations of India. With a better understanding of the happenings in India that Rushdie correlates with Saleem's life, I probably would have done much better in understanding the meaning and references of this book.

Although I didn't completely understand the story of Saleem as it refers to India, I did like some of the ways in which Rushdie explained the workings of life: the cooking of emotions into food, the way in which a family affects a person and a person affects a family, and further how a country affects a person and a person affects a country.

I also find interesting the (important?) role that women play throughout the story. In a nation where the rights and powers of women have journeyed a rocky road, it is interesting that Saleem was so affected by them.

• From greatbooks.org: "Are the women Saleem loves an integral part of his story or distractions from it?"
• From litlovers.com: "'... is not Mother India, Bharat-Mata, commonly thought of as female?' asks Saleem; 'And, as you know, there's no escape from her' (p. 465). Elsewhere he speaks of '...the long series of women who have bewitched and finally undone me good and proper' (p. 276). To what extent are women 'held for blame' for Saleem's misfortunes?"

Tonight I will start The Shack by William P. Young. If I'm like others who have read it before me, I should have it done by the end of the week if not sooner. For the next few days I will provide space for discussion about The Shack and then we will move on to the next list book, Main Street by Sinclair Lewis.