Imaginary Homelands by Salman Rushdie

Imaginary Homelands by Salman Rushdie

Salman Rushdie is Diasporic writer . who is an Indian-born British essayist and fiction writer. ‘ Imaginary Homeland’ is a collection of essay which covers variety of topics . ‘ Imaginary Homelands’ in this essay , he talks about the experience of London seminar (1982).

Essay begins with the lines ..

"An old photograph in a cheap frames hangs on a wall of the room where I work ."

Here in this essay he remembers his past life .he saw a hanging picture on the wall .it was of 1946 on  when he was not yet born. He remembers famous sentence from L.P. Hartley’s novel ‘The Go-Between’ - ‘Past is the Foreign Country’. Rusdhie begins with memory, it is about India, somewhere it is like that ‘Anxiety’. He says that Bombay is a city built by foreigners. He recalled his past memory, past Bombay. He also remembers saleem’s theme song.

"Mera joota hai japani
Ye patloon Inglistani
Sar pr lal topi Rusi
Phir bhi dil hai Hindustani"

He tells about his one topic of ‘Midnight’s children’ –Indian Pessimism. He says that Indian writes of England are the same animals. He asks what ‘Indian’ means outside India. Art is a passion of mind and the imagination works best when it is free.

He writes all this by saying that all things are a kind of imagination and he writes about India’s culture. He Articulate Nation and Nationalism . Here we connect with Bhabha’s idea of Nation : Nation, like Narrative , lose their orient in the myth of time and fully realize their horizons in the mind’s eyes. Such an image of nation or narration might seen impossibly romantic and excessively. her Rushdie’s idea of ‘Home’(locality)truly imagination, and it is symbolic one. because we can choose where we shift. We engaged with Home but in real sense it a imagination, there is not specific land (Home) society gives the name & identity. Each things and object signifies iidentity, all these things are imagination. Diaspora deals with Authentic. it is like ‘Bhel’, mixing of different things, numerous idea, and culture, than it is tasty. So whole essay about his recalling the days of India. It is Journey of Indian days, which is part of his memories.

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