In Haroun and the Sea of Stories, Salman Rushdie uses darkness imagery to illustrate censorship present within an allegorical Iranian society, thus criticizing Islamic Iran’s censorship.Rashid describes Khattam-Shud as “the Arch-Enemy of all Stories, even of Language itself. He is the Prince of Silence and the Foe of Speech” (39).Khattam-Shud is essentially the opposite of Rashid. By describing Khattam-Shud as an individual who hates all forms of speech, Rashid implies that Khattam-Shud enforces censorship, causing residents of Gup to know little about residents of Chup. Rushdie then surrounds Khattam-Shud with darkness imagery: “‘His name,’ whispered the Water Genie, and the sky darkened for an instant as he spoke it, ‘is Khattam-Shud.’” Another example of darkness imagery illustrating censorship and silence in Chup is when Rashid describes the Chupwala army encampment as such, “...black tents, wrapped in such a fanatical silence!” (Rushdie 101). On the same page, Rashid describes the idol of silence, Bezaban: “[Bezaban] is carved out of black ice...they say that the idol has no tongue…” (Rushdie 101). Thus, Rushdie uses darkness imagery to illustrate silence, and in conjunction, censorship.
Subsequently, Rushdie constructs the land of Chup as an allegorical representation of Iranian society. Rashid says that, “In the old days the Cultmaster, Khattam-Shud, preached hatred only towards stories and fancies and dreams; but now he has become more severe, and opposes Speech for any reason at all. In Chup City the schools and law-courts and theatres are all closed now, unable to operate because of the Silence Laws” (Rushdie 101). Rashid additionally describes Chup as: “...a place of shadows, of books that wear padlocks and tongues torn out; of secret conspiracies and poison rings” (Rushdie 102). In Iran, after the Iranian Revolution, Ayatollah Khomeini suppressed schools, newspapers, opposition parties, theaters, changed the system of law to sharia law, and killed many thousands of political prisoners (Moin 219) (Bakhash 68-69) (Mir-Hosseini). Due to Ayatollah Khomeini, Iran changed from a democracy into a theocratic Islamist state. Thus, this description of Chup closely parallels Iran under Ayatollah Khomeini’s reign, and shows Rushdie’s intent to use Chup as an allegorical representation of Islamist Iranian society. Furthermore, Rashid also states that, “[The] followers [of Bezaban] swear vows of lifelong silence to show their devotion” (Rushdie 101). This mirrors Islam, because both being born into an Islamic family or joining the faith indicates a lifelong commitment—the punishment for leaving the faith is death (Silas). With these two points, Rushdie creates Chup as an allegorical representation of an Islamist society based on Iran.
Finally, Rushdie uses this allegorical construct to criticize Islam. He has associated darkness imagery with Chup and censorship, and by extension, Islamist Iran. The negative allegorical characterization of Islamist extremism in Haroun mirrors Rushdie’s views; due to the suppression of his book, the Satanic Verses, by the Iranian government, Rushdie has held anti-censorship views. Rushdie has said, “Instead of realizing that we need to oppose these attacks on freedom of expression, we thought that we need to placate them with compromise and renunciation...” (Flood) He has also stated that, “...members of other religions have distorted language, but to a much lesser degree...the overwhelming weight of the problem lies in the world of Islam” (Singh). Therefore, Rushdie believes that Islamist Iran has corrupted language and speech by suppressing and censoring it. Thus, Rushdie uses darkness imagery to illustrate censorship, and associates it with his allegorical construct of an Islamist Iranian society; this construct is thereby used to espouse Rushdie’s personal views criticizing censorship by post-revolution Iran.
Works Cited
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Moin, Baqer. Khomeini: Life of the Ayatollah. New York: Thomas Dunne, 2000. Print.
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