Salman Rushdie's Haroun And The Sea Of Stories

In 1990, Salman Rushdie published his children’s novel, Haroun and the Sea of Stories. The novel is an allegory for many of the political and social issues his family was facing at the time, as Rushdie was in hiding due to the controversy of his 1988 novel, The Satanic Verses. Rushdie wrote the novel for his son to understand the events going on in their lives. The novel follows the young protagonist, Haroun Khalifa, who lives with his parents in a town that is described as "a sad city, the saddest of cities, a city so ruinously sad it had forgotten its name" (1). There is no real happiness in the city and soon his mother stops singing, eventually leaving with the upstairs neighbor. The story follows Haroun on his epic journey to find his father, Rashid’s, lost imagination, as he is a famous storyteller. The novel presents many children’s literacy themes such as: a
A child is mesmerized by being able to journey to far off lands and seeking out a magical object all from the safety of home. The beginning of Haroun and the Sea of Stories describes a city, so sad it has no name, that is so outside the norm for children today, they automatically know the land is far far away. They are immediately traveling to lands unknown in their imagination. From the sad city with no name, they travel to the Valley of K, the Land of Gup and the Land of Chup. The names Rushdie presents are so strange children and adults both appreciate the weirdness of it all. The children recognize there is about to be journey and Haroun is on a quest for not only a magical object but for adventure. It is through the journey the children are able to be introduced to magical creatures who are manifestations of hard lessons, but on a level a child can understand. The use of the hero’s journey and magical creatures help children to understand the hard issues they might be facing in their