{"id":15853,"date":"2015-05-25T00:14:54","date_gmt":"2015-05-25T04:14:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/?p=15853"},"modified":"2015-05-26T14:22:32","modified_gmt":"2015-05-26T18:22:32","slug":"salman-rushdie-the-duniazat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/2015\/05\/25\/salman-rushdie-the-duniazat\/","title":{"rendered":"Salman Rushdie: “The Duniaz\u00e1t”"},"content":{"rendered":"
Click here<\/a> to read the story in its entirety on\u00a0The New Yorker <\/em>webpage. Salman Rushdie's \"The Duniaz\u00e1t\" was originally published in the\u00a0June 1, 2015 issue of\u00a0The New Yorker<\/em>.<\/pre>\n
\"CV1_TNY_06_01_15Ulriksen.indd\"<\/a>This week’s fiction is from a living legend (though I admit I have had a hard time reading him for some time). From The Page Turner interview with Deborah Treisman we learn that this story is “about a love affair between Ibn Rushd and Dunia, a jinni posing as a young woman.<\/p>\n
On the one hand, I’d love to read a story about Averroes. On the other, I really disliked The Enchantress of Florence<\/em>, in which Rushdie called forth a character based upon Machiavelli.<\/p>\n
Looking forward to a good discussion, as always. Please leave your thoughts \u2014 or any other comments you might have \u2014 below.<\/p>\n
Also, Adrienne, who has been commenting here for some time and who blogs at The Story\u00a0Is Enough (here<\/a>),\u00a0is graciously\u00a0providing\u00a0her initial response to the story here, above the comments line.\u00a0Thanks Adrienne! Here she is:<\/p>\n
\n
This is the first story by Salman Rushdie I have read, and I was quite enchanted by it.\u00a0Combining fantasy and historical fiction in this tale about the 12th Century philosopher, Ibn Rushd, “The Duniaz\u00e1t” entertains us as it encourages us to think.<\/p>\n
Ibn Rushd is forced into exile for his thoughts, his writings, and must use his fortitude and resources to continue to survive.\u00a0He becomes a horse trader, a financier, a gardener.\u00a0He falls in love with a young woman who calls herself Dunia<\/em>, meaning “the world.” She becomes his lover and his housekeeper. They have many children, for she is quite insatiable. Only the stories he tells, the philosophies he had to abandon, calm her desire. He tells her tales based on former ideas of “reason, logic, and science” and\u00a0“the inevitability of cause and effect.”<\/p>\n
What Ibn Rushd does not know is that Dunia is really a jinni, “pursuing her fascination with human men in general and brilliant ones in particular.” Her most distinctive feature is her lack of earlobes, and all of their children inherit this quality.\u00a0While she is magic, she, too, is bound by the natural consequences of her choice. Their lives trickle into common, human patterns.\u00a0Physical intimacy fades, money problems wax, and time and energy for thought is overrun by the presence and clamor of children.\u00a0Even magic, even miracles, even God must follow natural laws.\u00a0Reason and religion must be reconciled.<\/p>\n
Then Ibn Rushd is called back to court suddenly. His exile is ended.\u00a0He does not take his children with him, nor Dunia\/the jinni. But “she went on loving him, even though he had so casually abandoned her.” Their bastard children, the children of a jinni and a philosopher, wander the earth, “ignorant of their supernatural origins,” adopting every kind of thought out there — some of faith, some of reason — never reconciling the two as Ibn Rushd, their father, had done. Secularism arose.<\/p>\n
Using magic to tell the story of the history of thought is fascinating.\u00a0It is a fairy tale that leaves so much room for thought and reader participation. “The Duniaz\u00e1t” is microcosm, “stories within stories.” Ibn Rushd’s experience mirrors the grander story of all of us: reconciliation between the polarities of thought that compete for our belief and the love affair between fantasy and rational thought.\u00a0We are the Duniaz\u00e1ts, their children.\u00a0What beliefs will we choose?\u00a0Can we live by faith and also by reason?\u00a0We are limited if we chose just one as the basis of all our thoughts. I know I will keep pondering this story throughout the week.\u00a0There are so many layers, so many ideas to unravel . . .<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Click here to read the story in its entirety on\u00a0The New Yorker webpage. Salman Rushdie’s “The Duniaz\u00e1t” was originally published in the\u00a0June 1, 2015 issue of\u00a0The New Yorker. This week’s fiction is from a living legend (though I admit I have had a hard time reading him for some time). From The Page Turner interview … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15855,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"libsyn-item-id":0,"libsyn-show-id":0,"libsyn-post-error":"","libsyn-post-error_post-type":"","libsyn-post-error_post-permissions":"","libsyn-post-error_api":"","playlist-podcast-url":"","libsyn-episode-thumbnail":"","libsyn-episode-widescreen_image":"","libsyn-episode-blog_image":"","libsyn-episode-background_image":"","libsyn-post-episode-category-selection":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_thumbnail":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_theme":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_height":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_width":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_placement":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_download_link":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_download_link_text":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_custom_color":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-explicit":"","libsyn-post-episode":"","libsyn-post-episode-update-id3":"","libsyn-post-episode-release-date":"","libsyn-post-episode-simple-download":"","libsyn-release-date":"","libsyn-post-update-release-date":"","libsyn-is_draft":"","libsyn-new-media-media":"","libsyn-post-episode-subtitle":"","libsyn-new-media-image":"","libsyn-post-episode-keywords":"","libsyn-post-itunes":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-number":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-season-number":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-type":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-title":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-author":"","libsyn-destination-releases":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data-enabled":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data-input-enabled":false,"libsyn-post-episode-premium_state":"","libsyn-episode-shortcode":"","libsyn-episode-embedurl":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[94,56],"tags":[560],"coauthors":[505],"class_list":["post-15853","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-new-yorker-fiction","category-salman-rushdie","tag-short-story"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/Rushdie.jpg?fit=880%2C1200&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pqqvZ-47H","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15853","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15853"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15853\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15875,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15853\/revisions\/15875"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15853"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15853"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15853"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=15853"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}