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Tone
Part 6
Explanation and Analysis—Salman and Salman:
In Part 6, "Return to Jahilia," a character named Salman, who is the prophet Mahound's scribe, begins to slightly alter the recitations Mahound claims come to him from the angel Gibreel. This makes him an unreliable narrator:
"If Mahound recited a verse in which God was described as all-hearing, all-knowing, I would write, all-knowing, all-wise. Here's the point: Mahound did not notice the alterations. So there I was actually writing the Book, or rewriting anyway, polluting the word of God with my own profane language. But, good heavens, if my poor words could not be distinguished from the Revelation by God's own Messenger, then what did that mean?
Here, the character Salman becomes an unreliable narrator: when he reads Mahound's words back to him, he includes small changes. His unreliability, though, is intended to test whether or not Mahound himself is being unreliable. If he notices, Salman reasons, he must be telling the truth about his recitations being holy; but if he doesn't, how can Salman take him at his word?
The notion that a prophet might be an unreliable narrator is highly provocative and often cited as offensive. But it's also a way of understanding how The Satanic Verses operate more broadly—particularly because Salman is also, of course, Rushdie's own name. By using an unreliable narrator to question the reliability of another important narrator, Rushdie sets up a complex dynamic of unreliability that also includes his own authorship. After all, he himself is narrating both Salman's (the character) and Mahound's words, along with the story of the angel (or mere movie star?) Gibreel. All together, these complications reveal a deeper theme of the novel: that language and storytelling are always shifting, unreliable, and multi-layered—because life itself, good and evil, are equally dynamic.
Related Themes:
