Events show you your principles, and a minor digression on the pluralization of "octopus": Quichotte, by Salman Rushdie

 This morning, we consider Salman Rushdie's 2019 novel inspired loosely by Don Quixote, complete with a novel-within-a-novel structure that will have even those of us who do not generally favor musical theater singing certain songs in our heads.  Rushdie approaches the concept, as one may expect, from the perspective of Indian-Muslim immigrants to the West, and consistent with his style, the novel is almost too densely packed with backstories and ideas to contemplate.  Somewhere between satire, brutal social commentary and fantastical fiction, with a sharp enough tongue to earn the highest literary honor one can earn-- a fatwa, although Cervantes may have approved of this one.  Hard to say.  Let's try to make some sense of, and derive some observations from Quichotte.

The role of Cervantes here is played by "the Author," also known as, "Brother," because the novel addresses his relationship with... yeah.  Anyway, the siblings grew up in Bombay before the name-change, and emigrated to the US and UK respectively.  Brother adopted the pen-name of Sam DuChamp, and started writing mediocre spy novels.  Eventually, he decided that he wanted to write something different, so he embarked on a new project, Quichotte.  The titular character is also an Indian immigrant to the United States, and of course, insane.  After a medical incident, he wound up unable to do much besides drive around and peddle opioids for his cousin's shadier-than-shady pharmaceutical company.  Eventually, the tv-addled Quichotte decides that he is obsessed with a television star, Salma, and starts writing her letters, embarking on a quest to win her love.  He drives off to New York to find her, while imagining a son-- Sancho, of course-- into existence.  Within that fictional world, there is some sort of science fictional universe collapse, while a tech billionaire tries to build portals into another world to save people, amid other wackiness.  (That world is Author/Brother's world, but there is a size differential, hence a weirdo ending).  At the reality level of Brother/Author, he deals with his own estranged son, who gets caught up in computer hacking and espionage, he tries to reconcile with Sister before she dies of cancer, and reality at all levels is filled with shit people.

That's about what can be said without getting lost in the tangles, of which there are many, and a few will be explored below for the sake of some observations.  I will note that writing in 2019, Rushdie was clearly caught up in the ascendant social justice movements, which is ironic for the fact that he is basically the most canceled author in history.

Consider a particularly funny example.  In Brother/Author's novel-within-the-novel, Salma's first American role was as the star of a spy series (because Brother/Author was writing semi-autobiographically, and yes, this means keeping track of everything requires paying more attention than a breezy action novel, or something like that).  Salma's character was a computer expert (remembering Brother/Author's son) who ascended the ranks of the intelligence community, to have some run-ins with the US President, who was clearly intended to be a not-very-flattering portrayal of the 2019 guy.  There is a scene in Salma's series in which Mr. Douchebag/Dumbass Fictional President is presented with something having to do with the plural form of a particular cephalopod.  The kind with a garden.  Why?  That does not matter.  What matters is that Mr. Douchebag/Dumbass Fictional President pluralizes "octopus" as "octopuses."  Salma, Ms. Smartypants in the show, mutters under her breath, "octopi," and it becomes a meme, in the culture, for smart women putting stupid men in their places.

There is a minor problem here.  The -pus suffix is from the Greek, not the Latin.  Converting to -i is the pluralization for Latin, not Greek.  For those taking notes, that means the plural of "octopus" is "octopuses."  There are debates about this, but I side with the purists and pedants, who argue that "octopi" is incorrect.  There is no justifiable claim that "octopuses" is incorrect.  The only question is whether or not both are correct.  (No.  Only "octopuses" is correct.)

What does that mean for the exchange described within the book (within the book)?  It means that the exchange could have been reversed.  Not-Trump could have said "octopi," and been corrected by Ms. Smartypants, and the scene would have been great.  The problem is that to most people, "octopuses" sounds awkward, and it makes a poor rallying cry/meme.  Yet if Not-Trump had said "octopuses," he would have sounded strangely, uncharacteristically educated.

Remember, this is a guy who stared directly at an eclipse without eye protection.  There is an eclipse soon.  Use eye protection.

Anyway, it was a discordant scene, included for some combination of the social politics, the gender and cultural politics, and shitting on Trump, and generally speaking, OK, as long as you do it right.  Somehow, Salman Rushdie fucked up the scene.  Weird.

Anyway, this detail was emblematic of Rushdie's place-setting, caught up in the social justice movement of 2019, when the mere presence of that guy seemed to drive so many leftward (I wrote a post a while back about what I call "mutual derangement syndrome").  In the novel-within-the-novel, Rushdie characterized the experience of South Asians as being constantly at risk of being beaten to death or shot, if they step into a "red state," which... no.  We have actual numbers on this.  The FBI compiles not just homicide data, but hate crime data, and no.  There is a scene in Author's novel in which two Indians are attacked by a random drunk who just rants at them, thinking they are "Iranian," and then the same thing happens to Brother in the "real" world, but this is not the real real world.  We have data.  I wouldn't recommend that African-Americans swing by the local klan rally for a taste of the local flavor, but this just isn't reality, according to FBI statistics on hate crimes.

But that is enough grumbling about what is, generally speaking, quite a good novel.  One could brush away the sillier elements, if one chooses, by saying that Author/Brother is kind of a hack anyway (he is), and the "real" world is a little more complex.  So let us look for some insight.

Quichotte, himself, wants to see himself as a good guy.  A knight in shining armor, one might say, who strives for a kind of nobility in his quest for love.  So far, so good, but he finds that his only way to get close to Salma is through his cousin's opioid business, because Salma is hooked on the high-end stuff, and Quichotte's cousin, Dr. Smile, uses people like our protagonist as a courier.  The moral qualm is that Quichotte knows the risks of overdose.  In order to come at all close to her, he has to agree to give her something that may kill her.

I was once more libertarian on substances, but the empirical experience of the cities that have effectively decriminalized them has convinced me that really, no, this shit is evil and its peddlers need to be locked in a room, and we throw away the room.  We have run the experiment, I was wrong, the scale of my wrongness is horrifying, and holy shit, no, lock these people up.  Lock up Dr. Smile (he does wind up on the run), lock up Quichotte, get 'em all, holy fuck.

Anyway, though, the point is the test.  What do you believe?  What principles do you hold?  If you abandon those principles because you have the hots for someone on tv, well, that's no principle, is it?

In the "real" world, Author/Brother comes back into contact with his estranged son, who had turned into a hacker/vigilante-type.  His son espoused something like principles, not doing it for money, but instead some sort of semi-revolutionary Anonymous-style thing.  Funny, but when the Feds come knocking and they offer a deal, big bucks and a cool job, or prison and your principles, what does he choose?  Well, what would most people choose?  If it's any consolation, the job is out on an isolated ranch somewhere, and there isn't much to do but watch Netflix and hit the gym, but then again, everyone could use a little more exercise anyway.  Still, principles schminciples.

Where do you see characters do right?  You do see families start to reconcile, after years of estrangement.  Brother and Sister do get their brief moment, at the end.  Of course, what was the cost?  And it was handed to them, because Sister's daughter tricked Brother, via an email that made him think that Sister, herself, was reaching out.  Doing the right thing is easy, when it is costless.  You learn your principles when there is a cost.

Is it costless to reconcile?  Much of the novel is about reconciliation, families with secrets and long-held grudges.  Some of those secrets are horrifying.  Yet what is the cost of reconciliation?  That's the horrible thing.  Anyone who wants it can have it.  The costs, as the reader sees because Rushdie can write this kind of thing, are the costs of the time to do it, but one way or another, you pay that cost anyway.  The cost is the opportunity cost, in economic terms.  You can reconcile, or do something else with your time, but the time is spent either way.  Simply maximize the utility you derive from it, and from that perspective, to reconcile is not costly should the parties want it.

That, then, is a) not a principle, and b) a disappointing commentary on the rarity of reconciliation.  There are things that cannot be reconciled or forgiven, but at the interpersonal level, they are fewer than our behavior would suggest.  We demonstrate lack of virtue, then, and when the real questions come, we show our principles.  To reconcile?  If we do, that does not impress, because that should have been easy.  The fact that Brother and Sister wait until the end?  No.  Just, no.

Yes, they did it.  They met the low bar, at the last minute.

But what you really believe?  That's what you show when faced with the hard questions.

Good book, despite a few misses.

Charlie Hunter & Leon Parker, "Belief," from Duo.