THE ENCHANTRESS OF FLORENCE
Salman Rushdie
Random House
Fiction
ISBN: 9780375504334

• Read an Excerpt

In THE ENCHANTRESS OF FLORENCE, his 11th work of fiction, Salman Rushdie has given the breath of life to a world completely alien to our own, and yet, in distinctive ways, rooted in a reality possible for us to recognize. Rushdie is a master teller of tales, and the seductiveness of this delightful work, which blends characters from the historical to the fantastic, is certain to burnish that reputation.

The novel opens in the late 16th century, when a yellow-haired character in a multicolored coat, calling himself Mogor dell’Amore, appears in Fatehpur Sikri, the gleaming capital city of the Mughal Empire, ruled by Akbar the Great, a descendant of Genghis Khan and Timur the Lame (Tamerlane). Akbar is in many ways a strikingly modern man, questioning the existence of God and presiding over spirited debates in the Tent of the New Worship between competing philosophical schools --- the Water Drinkers, religious thinkers and mystics, and the Wine Lovers, philosophers and scientists. And yet this same rationalist skeptic has created an imaginary queen named Jodha, to whom he’s more devoted than any of the dozens of beautiful wives who comprise his harem.

The Mogor, bearing a stolen letter containing credentials as the ambassador of England’s Queen Elizabeth I, describes himself as “a man with a secret…a secret which only the emperor’s ears may hear.” Woven through the balance of the novel, the storyteller (born Niccolò Vespucci) unveils that secret, narrating the mysterious, enthralling tale of the devastatingly beautiful Qara Köz (Lady Black Eyes), the enchantress of the novel's title, and her companion, the Mirror. Born into the Persian Empire, Qara Köz is captured by Antonino Argalia, a Florentine soldier of fortune now in the service of the Ottoman Turks. Argalia's boyhood friends include the starkly realistic political philosopher Niccolò Machiavelli and Agostino Vespucci, cousin of the New World explorer, Amerigo.

Argalia returns with his gorgeous prize to Florence, and when Qara Köz and the Mirror arrive, Rushdie tells, in a typical example of the lavish description with which the novel is suffused, how “their faces shone with the light of revelation, as though in those early days of their unveiling they were capable of sucking light in from the eyes of all who looked upon them and then flinging it out again as their own personal brilliance, with mesmeric, fantasy-inducing effects.” Argalia assumes the role of condottiere of the city, chosen by the ruling Medici family to protect its interests in the myriad political and religious conflicts of the early Renaissance. Qara Köz, now known as Angelica, captivates the citizens of Florence, and it appears a golden age is at hand. But when the Medici ruler, Lorenzo II, dies suddenly and under mysterious circumstances, the Florentines suspect their cherished enchantress has practiced witchcraft to bring about his death and drive her into exile.

Rushdie’s tale overflows with fantastic characters and amazing stories: a court painter named Dashwanth who literally paints himself into a portrait, or a “glowing lake” that “looked like a sea of molten gold” transformed into a “muddy hollow where once…sweet water had glistened” in a matter of days. There are magic potions and spells, like the “Great Uzbeg Anti-Shiite Potato and Sturgeon Curse,” albino giants, witches, heroes and cowards, scoundrels and fools. There’s even a gruesome account of a battle between Argalia’s Ottoman forces and the army of Vlad the Impaler, the cruel ruler on whose life the tale of Dracula is based.

Alongside these vivid creations of Rushdie’s imagination are well-known historical figures like Akbar and Machiavelli, and lesser-known ones like the Italian warlord Andrea Doria. As much as THE ENCHANTRESS OF FLORENCE is infused with striking characters and lavishly spun tales, Rushdie also toys with big ideas: the relations between men and women, the cultural encounter between East and West, the uses of political power and the struggle between modernity and tradition.

The novel is multilayered and complex, and there’s some degree of patience required at times to absorb all the characters and place names tossed into the bubbling stew. It’s probably not a bad idea to have an historical resource close by when reading. Indeed, Rushdie lists more than four pages of works he consulted in researching this book.

“The story was completely untrue,” one of Rushdie’s characters notes, “but the untruth of untrue stories could sometimes be of service in the real world.” Those words might serve as a suitable epigraph for a work that is itself so enchanting and teeming with life.

    --- Reviewed by Harvey Freedenberg (mwn52@aol.com)

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