Salman Rushdie on Memory

I was looking through some of the links to Rushdie sites that classmates have in their journals and came across an interview at http://www.subir.com/rushdie/uc_maps.html.

In response to the question of how he prepares himself to write Rushdie replies:

I think I relied mostly on memory. I spent a long time just kind of excavating my memory and the memories of other people. And when there were errors in the remembering, I found I quite liked that, because I didn't want to write something that had journalistic truth but rather some- thing that had a kind of remembered truth. And of course memory does plan those tricks. For instance -- this is something that Indian readers catch at once -- at one point Ganesh is described as having sat at the feet of Valmiki and taking down the Ramayana, which of course he didn't. There are a lot at mistakes like that: they are consciously introduced mistakes. The texture of the narrative is such that it almost depends upon being an error about history; otherwise it wouldn't be an accurate piece of memory, because that's what narrative is, it's something remembered.

I was soo excited when I read this! Obviously, memory and stories have been a huge part of Rushdie's writings. I especially like that he discusses the fallibility of memory. That it can never be truly perfect; that the only way to accuratly portray memory is to include the forgotten or misremembered moments. His mention of the idea of a "remembered truth" also intrigued me. It reminds me of Plato's theory about our pre-birth expanse of knowledge. Plato argues that we know everything before we were born and that we forget it when we enter this world. Rushdie seems to be alluding to a similar idea that there are some truths that all people, in all situations know at some level. The question becomes, do they remember?

Rushdie also mentions one of our favorite people as an influence in his writing. :O) It seems that Joyce has given Rushdie confidence to try things that other, less talanted, authors may not have the assurance to do.

As for other influences, well, there's Joyce, for a start... And Joyce, because Joyce shows you that you can do anything if you do it properly.