Book Review: The Enchantress of Florence

In Salman Rushdie’s first historical novel, The Enchantress of Florence, a young European traveler, “Mogor dell’Amore,” arrives in Akbar’s court. The European has a secret which in turn forces other secrets to come out of the Mughal cupboards. Reviewing the book, Kanchan Gupta says that it is not as good as his earlier novels.

His first historical novel, woven around romance and fantasy, heavily researched (as the detailed bibliography shows) and strenuously crafted, does not quite add weight to his admirable repertoire of fiction. Rushdie began to slip with The Moor’s Last Sigh, and hasn’t quite stopped sliding down the hill since then. His ethereal Jodha Bai, who satiated the mortal Akbar’s desire by scratching him — “she was adept at the seven types of unguiculation, which is to say the art of using the nails to enhance the act of love” — is a pathetic parody of history.