A Study on Historical Fictional Novel “The Enchantress on Florence” By Salman Rushdie

Salman Rushdie, a British-Indian novelist and essayist, who combines magical and realistic details in his fiction and non-fiction, can be compared with English authors like E. L. Doctorow, Angela Carter, Peter Carey or Emma Tennant. His prose synthesizes imagery, ideas, and patterns of sound and sense. His literary works prove the versatility of his literary talent and his universal interest in probing the possibilities for a mutual understanding of cultures as different as those in the East and in the West. “The Enchantress of Florence” is Rushdie’s tenth novel published in 2008. The story of the novel is set against the background of Europe and the Orientals in the 16th century. The novel seems to be historically accurate but conceived fictionally. It is rich in presenting minute details of the respective era, which is stylistically opulent. The novel concentrates upon the history of Mughal Era and Renaissance age; relationship between East and West; fantasy and fables; cross cultural storytelling and journeying etc., the novel primarily concentrates on the mutual suspicion and mistrust between East (India’s Mughal Empire) and West (Renaissance Florence), Ottoman Empires, the earlier Mongols etc. Through the novel of Salman Rushdie’s The Enchantress of Florence (2008), the paper therefore frames mythology, magic, imagination as well as reality. It tells of a visit from Italy by a mysterious man, Mogor, to the imperial palace of Akbar, called Fatehpur Sikri. In so many other languages, the trickster-traveler is versatile and seemingly abandoned. The study even reflects on how Rushdie achieves by incorporating the history of the East as well as of the West in recreating a Modern Era. Through putting out an analysis by reader-centric and text-centric strategies, the imagination, romantic as well as creative notions, the narrative strategy, the magic as well as practical elements and linguistic carnival in the book can be adequately examined. Rushdie’s hybrid identity as an Indian, now migrated to Britain, very well suits the technique of magic realism in order to raise voice for those who are marginalized because of their language, religion, caste and nationality.