Why not Salman Rushdie? A short story of desire and disappointment

Salman Rushdie, Indian-born as we never forget to add, almost won the Nobel Prize for literature. Almost. He was this close, we were this close! Only when he didn’t, despite being the darling of bookies in a tight race with Annie Ernaux from France (who won it), Ngugi Wa Thiong'o from Kenya, Haruki Murakami from Japan, Jon Fosse from Norway, Antigua-born Jamaica Kincaid, etc., did we stop mentally converting 10 million Swedish kronor into Indian rupees. Magic realism, as we knew it, stopped just outside our front door.

Of course, if Rushdie had won, a hot debate over Ernaux’s loss would have followed, which we may have scrutinised for merit in a cool, intellectual way. But as we wail why why why did he not win, our hearts are thumping and fists clenched. Remember when Bob Dylan got the prize? The response was both treble and bass. But this now is emotional business, not the routine ‘for’ or ‘against’ that newspapers indulge in.

While Ernaux is the 16th French writer to bag a Nobel, Rushdie would have been only the second Indian to do so – after Rabindranath Tagore won it for Gitanjali way back in 1913. At 75, Rushdie is younger than she and may well win this prize in the future, fingers crossed, but this year his fans ached for him to get it for a variety of reasons. One, they love what he did to the English language, setting it free in a uniquely Indian way. Two, he had to go into hiding and lived a nightmarish life after a fatwa was issued against him in 1989 following the publication of his book Satanic Verses. Three, he was bizarrely stabbed while talking on stage about two months back in New York.

Somehow, felt his readers, the timing of the prize would have made up for what can only be called a series of unfortunate events. On the other hand, argue the same fans, this would have then looked like a pity prize.