Magazine 2015
International Peer-Reviewed Journal
RESEARCH HORIZONS, VOL. 5 JULY 2015
THE CONTEMPORARY TERRORIST NOVEL AS NOVELS OF
PROTEST: MOHSIN HAMID ORHAN PAMUK SALMAN RUSHDIE
Jayashree Palit
ABSTRACT
Terrorism has been defined as the use of violence to achieve political, economic and/or social objectives.
The paper explores the theoretical argument (Political Process Theory) that terrorism should be viewed as
a form of political communication much like civic engagement activities such as voting, marching and
protesting. It examines how three writers have focused on terrorism and counter terrorism in relation to
religious and secular identities. Do these writers regard terrorism as a form of political communication? Can
these novels be categorized as a form of protest literature? The paper attempts to find answers to these
questions.
Key Words : terrorism; protest literature; religious fundamentalism.
Introduction :
A new theme for fiction, has emerged since the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on
September 11, 2001. The focus of the post 9/11 novel in the genre is on the rise of international terrorism
and it foregrounds religious fundamentalism. According to Hoffman these novels deal with religious
imperatives and its distinctive “value systems, mechanisms of legitimation and justification, concepts of
morality and world view” (Hoffman 94-95). These novels can be read in actually specific ways as narratives
that critique official responses to terrorist attacks or as East-West encounters or what Samuel Huntington
would term the Clash of Civilizations. (Wilson 91)
Three novels that focus on terrorism and counter terrorism in relation to religious and secular identities,
and on issues of national security and individual freedom, can be read in terms of national politics as well
as global events. Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2007) a psychological study of cultural
clash set in Pakistan and the United States. Orhan Pamuk’s Snow (2004) a postmodern fable of religious
and ideological factionalism set in Eastern Turkey and Salman Rushdie’s Shalimar the Clown (2005) that
focuses on Western fears about the manifestations of terror and its sources in Islamic fundamentalism. All
three novels engage with the threat posed by the other often within national boundaries and exploring
the psychology and motivation of the terrorist. Why do they do what they do? (Wilson 91-93)
The question whether these novels can be considered to be protest literature is one that is bound to
evoke mixed responses. Protest literature can broadly be defined as thought provoking and incisive
writings on the struggle of humanity against social injustice. These writings confront war, racism, patriarchy,
and other social issues. In that sense almost all literature can be called protest literature in a sense that
they all portray a point of view or theme. Hence a special distinction is often made. Protest literature has
to be specifically written for change. The author needs to have specific goals for change in society or
individuals from the very start.
Stauffer defines protest literature as text that not only criticizes and protests society, but that suggests,
either explicitly or implicitly, a solution to society’s ills. The important need, it seems, is to challenge and
extend definitions of protest literature. McCarthy defines protest literature as a mode and style of social
analysis which can change depending its time period and political climate .He further adds that it does
not necessarily have to involve or demand a change in intellectual currents, but merely articulate extant
social sentiments (The Harvard Crimson).
The three novels that have been taken up for detailed study can be seen as texts of social analysis (and
by extension protest literature) that deal with one of the most important issues of our times – Terrorism.
Terrorism is a highly contested concept. As the popular saying goes one man’s terrorist will always be
another man’s freedom fighter! Terrorism has been defined as the use of violence to achieve political,
economic and/ or social objectives. Matthew Todd Bradley emphasizes that fact that the major assumption
of the theory of political process is that conflict is inherent and that power structures are the main
determinants of domestic conflicts Terrorist politics ultimately involves a direct challenge to the existing
status quo and is disruptive. Terrorism is seen as an alternative political communication. For Bradley
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RESEARCH HORIZONS, VOL. 5 JULY 2015
terrorism is a means (like voting and protesting) to an end. The writers have their individual take on the
issue and it is the purpose of the paper to analyze the approach taken by literary works to the problem
of terrorism and how the texts can be broadly categorized as protests against social injustice.
What can literary works of fiction tell us about terrorism and what drives terrorists and support for terrorism
that social science cannot? This is an important question to address. The political discourse on terrorism
lacks a way of thinking about the darkest motives of individual lives and goes deeper than paradigms
like the ‘clash of civilizations’. The novelists show compassion for young people involved in terrorist
networks that theoretical texts are lacking. They help us to know and experience why someone chooses
terror. We get inside the mind of the terrorist. They focus on feeling ‘terror’ instead of a particular political
tactic ‘terrorism’.
In analyzing the literary response one finds several possibilities of viewing terrorism other than the
process theory outlined by Bradley and others. One of the theoretical frames that may be used to
examine how the writers, taken up to study in this paper, have presented the conflict between western
and Islamic civilizations is the ‘clash of civilizations’ which is a theory proposed by political scientist
Samuel P. Huntington. This paper uses this theory as a framework. Huntington states that people’s
cultural and religious identities will be the primary source of conflict in the post-cold war world. In the
1
993 Foreign Affairs article, Huntington wrote that it was his hypothesis that the fundamental source of
conflict in the new world will not be primarily ideological or primarily economic. The great divisions
among humankind and the dominating source of conflict will be cultural. Nation states will remain the
most powerful actors in the world affairs, but the principal conflicts of global politics will occur between
nations and groups of different civilizations. (Huntington, 1996)
Religious fundamentalism usually begins as a response to what is often experienced as a materialistic
assault by the liberal or secular world. Their enemies are not merely the American led forces of globalization
but also those domestic groups which have accepted the alien influences of modernity and imposed
them on Muslim people. The rise of terrorism can be seen as a struggle against globalization finding its
ideological sustenance in particularist values and beliefs.
In today’s world, we are witnessing the insurgence of religious identity. This single dimensional
categorization of human beings is dangerous. An Islamist instigation of violence against infidels may
want Muslims to forget that they have any identity other than being Islamic. What is disturbing is that
those who oppose this kind of fundamentalism also suffer from the same intellectual disorientation by
seeing Muslims primarily as members of an Islamic world. This has been very ably delineated in the
novels taken up for study. What is now needed is a “dialogue among civilizations” which challenges the
notion of reducing many- sided human beings to one dimension. Mohammed Khatami introduced the
idea of Dialogue Among civilizations as a response to the theory of clash of civilizations. The term
Dialogue Among civilizations became famous after the United Nations adopted a resolution to name the
year 2001 as the year of Dialogue Among Civilizations (UNESCO). All three novelists Orhan Pamuk,
Mohsin Hamid and SalmanRushdie underline the fact that there is a strong need to question and debate
the central issues of globalization.
Snow (Turkish Kar) is a novel by Turkish author Orhan Pamuk. It was published in Turkish in 2002 and in
English (translated by Maireen Freely) in 2004. The story encapsulates many of the political and cultural
tensions of modern Turkey namely the clash between secularists and Islamists. The novel vividly portrays
cruelty and intolerance of both the Islamic fundamentalists and the representatives of the secularist
Turkish state. The latter represents the westernizing ideology reinforced brutally by the military.
The fundamentalists appeal to the sense of tribal identity. Blue tells a story from the ancient epic Shehname
“
once upon a time millions of people knew it by heart… But now, because we’ve fallen under the spell of
west, we’ve forgotten our own stories”(Pamuk.2004,81). The reader is left to conclude the implications of
his question to Ka “Is this story so beautiful that a man could kill for it” (Pamuk.2004,81).
The issue of the headscarves becomes a symbol of asserting one’s tribal identity. The epigraph from
Dostoevstey – “Well then, eliminate the people, curtail them, force them to be silent (Pamuk.2004,81).
Because the European enlightenment is more important than people – sums up the west’s arrogant
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approach to fundamentalist political movements. Despite Kemal Ataturk’s westernizing ideology, Kars is
sunk in poverty and hopelessness, its bourgeoisie had fled.
Pamuk has given eloquent voice to the anger and frustration of both sides. These are no monsters but
ordinary human beings who actually have much more in common than they would wish to acknowledge.
The novel reveals the difficulties faced by a nation torn between tradition, religion and modernization.
Set in the farthest east of Turkey, the locals are certain that in western eyes they all considered ignorant
yokels. Western hubris, as Huntington’s theory implies is a catalyst for an insurgence of tribal identity.
Religion is the easiest crutch to rely on. As one character says “To play the rebel heroine in Turkey you
don’t pull off your scarf, you put it on” (Pamuk.2004.319)
The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid, published in 2007 is about a young Pakistani named
Changez who goes to America and is alienated from the promise of the west. The novel is written as a
monologue by Changez who tells the story of his success and subsequent disillusionment to a American
stranger he encounters at a Lahore café. The unnamed American may or may not be a spy just as
Changez may or may not be a terrorist. It is also an account of one man’s departure from America. As
Mohsin Hamid writes that the immigrant narrative becomes an emigrant narrative, almost a fable where
America is no longer pulling but pushing. It is a reversal a polarity from attraction to repulsion.
Changez lived the American dream for four and half years. After studying at Princeton, he finds a job at
one of the leading consultant firms in New York. Gains and losses, the economic fundamentals of the new
world, determine his thinking and actions. From this point Changez is torn between the desire to belong
and his pride in his muslim heritage, his muslim identity. The events that follow 9/11 drive him to leave
America and return to Pakistan to organize anti –American protests.
The author has commented on the double meaning of the title. “He is a reluctant fundamentalist because
his environment sees him as a religious fundamentalist though he isn’t one. He, on the other hand, rejects
the economic fundamentalism of the business world to which he belongs – a world oriented solely
around gains and losses”. Thus, the author dovetails both cultural and economic clashes into the theme
of the novel. As he writes that for me, this is what fundamentalism is, looking at the world from a single
perspective, thereby excluding all other perspectives. The novel not only reflects Huntington’s theory of
the ‘clash of civilizations’ but it also underscores America’s imperial hubris (economic and political) and
its posture as the world police force.
The turning point for Changez is the collapse of the Twin Towers and with that his carefully constructed
world of the American dream also collapses. His smile as he watches the Twin Tower collapse is provocative
What hurts Changez most is the group punishment being meted out to an entire religious group.. This is
the result of the fear psychosis that has gripped the west and is the antithesis of global citizenship.
Changez starts questioning his loyalties, his patriotism, the cultural barriers between the east and the
west and most of all his identity as a citizen of the world. No matter how “globalized” the world gets,
when it comes to the crunch most align with their tribal identities. Thus, Huntington’s theory of the clash
of civilization is made evident in this novel. At the same time, other aspects of the globalization debate
also figure namely, how American capitalism, which linked Changez to America now, pushes him back to
revealing its dark side.
Of course, Mohsin Hamid is, as he himself states, a novelist, not a political theoretician. It is remarkable
how this short novel negotiates the political with the personal. It is the story of one man’s decision to
leave the west and assert his tribal identity. The novel creates a web of fear and suspicion that remains till
the end. It seems that the novel is more of a protest, a kind of message to the west that their policies will
only instigate and intensify terror.
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RESEARCH HORIZONS, VOL. 5 JULY 2015
Hamid deals with the question of whether globalization has heightened the attraction of fundamentalism.
When Changez is working in New York, doing his job and making good money, any attachments to his
Pakistani – Muslim identity are easily manageable. But when suddenly he feels that those worlds are in
conflict, those latent tribal identities well up inside him and shatter the veneer of being a global cosmopolitan
citizen. It’s important to remember that tribal identity, which the globalized world tends to mute in order
to have us all get along better with each other, has not entirely disappear
Shalimar the Clown (2005) is a novel by Salman Rushdie. Salman Rushdie’s Shalimar the clown is not a
clown, but a Kashmiri man who became a terrorist. The reason given is personal revenge. Shalimar kills
Max Ophuls, the former U.S. ambassador to India who has seduced the woman Shalimar loved and then
betrayed her. The novel begins in Los Angeles in 1991 when Shalimar kills Max Ophuls. Khagendra
Acharya in ‘Hypocrisy for Survival: Redefining Terrorism in Shalimar the Clown’ has analyzed that the
murder story entails an alternative definition of terrorism Shalimar’s motivation is personal revenge but
Westerner’s view it as a terrorist attack. Rushdie thus resists western discourse of terrorism as a
consequence of Islamic fundamentalism. Sucheta M. Choudhuri in ‘Death was not the end’ resentment,
history and narrative structure in Salman Rushdie’s Shalimar the clown’ is of the view that the narrative
continually blurs the dwindling line between the personal and the political. The eponymous Shalimar
merges his hurt for Macmillan Ophuls with the larger project of the liberation of Kashmiri, to which end he
becomes an initiate the pan Islamic insurgent groups. Arijana Luburic makes an interesting point concerning
the symbolism of Shalimar’s determination to wreak vengeance. For her, Shalimar’s humiliation symbolizes
the humiliation of Islamic culture by the US in particular and the west in general. (Luburic, 253-58)
Rushdies novel offers a strong criticism on expression of all kinds whether it derives from nationalist,
jihadist or personal motives. It includes ordinary moderate Muslims and Hindus and celebrates the
harmony between there different religious groups. It also criticizes US foreign policy which, among other
things has contributed to the creation of conditions which made it possible for contemporary terrorist
networks to grow.
The analysis of the literary response to the issue of terrorism clearly shows that the writers are not too
concerned with the political analysis of the phenomenon. Thus, the political process theory expounded
by Bradley and others is not the main focus at all. Samuel Huntington’s thesis of the clash of civilizations
is a paradigm that is a better theoretical framework to help explain the three terrorist novels selected for
this paper. The Reluctant Fundamentalist and Snow in particular play on anxieties and uncertainties about
social, ethnic and religious differences. Fears of proximity to an unknown, featureless terrorist cause the
victimization of innocent persons. The fluctuating intimacies between Changez and his American interlocutor
is ambiguous and dangerous and the political factionalizing and polarization in Snow suggests that self-
collectivity in Turkish society can find its identity only in antagonistic relation to the other. The problematic
perception of the other is mediated through the media, which propagate stereotypes and blurred images
that become turning points in the plot. Political reporting stirs up public uncertainty by playing in fears of
annihilation and developing an atmosphere of mistrust, suspicion and menace, thus diminishing the
characters sense of reality.
In The Reluctant Fundamentalist the media begins to shift Changez’s perceptions, catalyzing his religious
conversion and in a sense restructuring his real life. He is not moved by the tragedy when watching on TV
and twin towers collapsing in 9/11 but experiences vicarious pleasure at the right of Goliath being cut
down to size. He was caught up in the symbolism of it all, the fact that someone had so visibly brought
America to her knees (R.F. 83)
In Snow the media control of reality is parodied as representing what will happen once printed insure that
the event will come to pass. As Serdar Bey, owner of the Border City Gazette in Kars and proponent of
state ideology says to Ka “you should see how amazed people are when things do happen only because
we’ve written them up first” (Snow 29) For example, when Ka arrives in Kars and the local paper reports he
has written a poem called ‘Snow’ which he later writes. When Ka comments that he is an atheist, this is
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RESEARCH HORIZONS, VOL. 5 JULY 2015
reported in the newspaper along with the news of his death at the hands of fundamentalist, which does
indeed happen some years later, after he has returned to Frankfurt.
The uncertainties created by cultural threat and political upheaval, whether explicitly linked to
fundamentalism or not, are manifested in revised national ideologies and self identifications through a
heightened awareness that national borders are porous and potential conducts to external threats and
danger.
The novels do not seek to understand terrorism on its own terms or as part of a political process. But
they do give focus to the fragility of power relations within and between nations and cultures and the
ways they can be maneuvered and destabilized.
References :
Acharya, Khagendra https://khagendra.wordpress.com/2008/09/22/hypocrisy-for-survival-redefining-
terrorism-in-shalimar-the-clown/
Bradley Mathew Todd www.researchgate.net/.../228992067-Terrorism-as-an- alternative- form-of-
communication July 22, 2011
Choudhuri Sucheta M. http://www.otherness.dk/fileadmin/www.othernessandthearts. org/Publications/
Journal_Otherness/Otherness__Essays_and_Studies_2.1/5.Sucheta_Choudhuri
Hoffman, Bruce. Inside Terrorism. London: Victor Gollancz, 1998. Print
Huntington, Samuel P. The Clash of Civilizations and The Remaking of World Order New York. Penguin
Book 1996 Print.
Khatami Mohammed. Round Table: Dialogue Among Civilizations United Nations, New York, 5 Sep 200.
UNESCO
Rubin-Wills J. Daniel Panelist Discuss Protest-Literature www.thecrimson.com/.../ panelists discuss protest-
literature April 4, 2005
Wilson Janet ‘The Contemporary Terrorist Novel and Religious Fundamentalism: Richard Flanagan, Mohsin
Hamid, Orhan Pamuk in Burning Books Negotiations Between Fundamentalism and Literature, edited by
Catherine Person- Miquel and Klaus Stierstorfer, AMS Press Inc, New York. 2012 Print.
Dr. Jayashree Palit, Associate Professor, Dept. of English, Maniben Nanavati Women’s College, Mumbai.
Where is the life we have lost in living? Where is the wisdom we have lost in
knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?
T. S. Eliot
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