The Invention of Truth. Salman Rushdie between Truth and Make-Believe

In this book, the literary world of Salman Rushdie is carefully scrutinised using a ‘metaleptical’ critical approach. Weaving together truth and fiction, reality and fantasy in his novels, the Anglo-Indian author’s work exudes a ‘metamodern’ sensibility as it seamlessly weaves the fabric of real-world experience with the intricate patterns of language and art. Beginning with the contradictions and errors in the narrative of Rushdie’s first masterpiece Midnight’s Children, through the blending of the sacred and the secular in The Satanic Verses, to the palindromic movement of the mutual convergence of life and writing in Quichotte, the volume takes the reader on a journey of discovery of the creative power of language and how it shapes and is shaped by history. Salman Rushdie’s work offers, in fact, the opportunity to engage in a nuanced examination of the balance between historical reality and artistic expression, individual aspirations and collective needs, continuity and decay, truth and make-believe.