A Winning Comeback

Victory City heralds Salman Rushdie's return to signature themes and powerful storytelling

- Aditya Mani Jha

Salman Rushdie had finished Victory City well before the attempt on his life last year. Can one feel a sense of premonition for something that has already happened? It's tough not to read echoes of Rushdie's life (including, and especially, the tragic events of August '22) in the overarching concerns of his latest novel. Victory City is structured as the "retelling" of an epic poem called 'Jayaparajaya' (literally, 'victorydefeat') written by Pampa Kampana, Rushdie's sorcerer-poet protagonist. Kampana wills the empire of Vijayanagar (literally, the titular 'victory city') into existence and then watches its rise and fall, all the while engrossed in composing her masterpiece even as monarchs surge and shrink around her.