The Gift of Writers in Animating the Past to the Present as Tales of Remembrance: A Comparative Study of Salman Rushdie’s Victory City and Amitav Ghosh’s Jungle Nama

Abstract

The research focuses on how fantasy is manifested as part of storytelling. Salman Rushdie’s Victory City (2023) and Amitav Ghosh’s Jungle Nama (2021) adopt ancient myths and histories that serve as remembrance tales. Both Rushdie and Ghosh evince a common interest in exploring social issues in their writings through an allegorical form. Rushdie’s Victory City is about the history of the Vijayanagar Empire, one of the most distinguished empires of medieval India (14^th century to 16^th century). Rushdie submitted his final edits of Victory City before the attack in New York City (Chautauqua) for his controversial novel The Satanic Verses. In the month of August 2022, he was stabbed in public by a youngster. He tweets that there is no freedom for authors to express themselves through writing. So, the research focuses on how fantasy serves as a tool for authors to express their views. His Victory City made him overcome all the negative criticism that he had encountered during the attack. Ghosh’s Jungle Nama also adopts the history of Sundarbans’ Forest goddess, Bon Bibi. Ghosh through his narration blends the myth and history of Bon Bibi who have been worshipped for centuries by the people of Sundarbans. Blending the real and imaginary in both fictions greatly challenges the differentiation between authenticity and fantasy. The supernatural phenomena in these narratives transport the reader from reality as a kind of escapism. During this, the characters in the fiction recall the past events and visions of the future in their present, and these aspects are also explored in the analysis. Victory City and Jungle Nama encounter the experience of mysticism in their narration which embarks on a voyage of difficulties and hindrances in the unreal world. Both these speculative fiction explore the concepts of fantasy and mystery so the theory of Magical Realism is applied to the strange creatures, other worlds, evils, demons, and demi-gods that exist in the fanciful setting which is also discussed.