Rushdie's imagery of the nose throughout the text Midnight's Children really struck me.. I read this novel not seeing it as an archive but rather looking for evidence of archives within it. The first thing that stuck out to me in a "triumphal arch" (p. 8) was the nose of Aadam Aziz. This was not the first reference to the olfactory organ. On the first page, Saleem Sinai, our narrator, lists among his nicknames "Snotnose" and "Sniffer"; and finishes the first paragraphe with "And I couldn't even wipe my own nose at the time." This imagery carries throughout much of the work as we see Saleem's history being told. Thick descriptions of his predecessors reveal that this nose is "a nose to start a family on" (p. 8) because the shape of the nose was an unmistakable of having been born a descendant of Aadam Aziz. This kind of archive, an archive of genetics and physicality, is one that we found our histories upon. As his mother commented at his birth: "look, janum, the poor fellow, he's got his grandfather's nose" (p. 131).
This nose resurfaces throughout the text and grounds Saleem Sinai's connection to and belonging to his family. This has interesting implications for the book which is about the senses in the physical and extra-ordinary ways.
The nose of Saleem Sinai, we come to discover, is not the nose of Aadam Aziz, but rather of a French grandmother from whose family Saleem was switched at birth. Two archives brought together and similar enough that they could be switched without recognition - even by the two sets of parents upon whom such deception was committed.
And yet, Saleem still identifies this nose with that of his grandfather. For him its similarity is such that the truth behind the archive does not matter as much as the archive itself, or what a reading of the archive itself might imply.
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So glad to see discussion of the body as archive! This issue of birthright/write and genetics is intriguing, as is the repeated issue of impotence, on two fronts - one, the historical connection between noses and penises (see Shakespeare, for one), and two, the problems of reproduction and creating a birthright when no sex is occurring.
On the first account, it is amusing that here, noses are large, growing protuberances, and penises are - well, not.
On the second, as Mac mentioned, it is fascinating that biological parenthood is repeatedly not an issue - that Saleem later claims the child of Shiva (the man who should have been Saleem). While the nose is no longer the genetic trait, elephant-like ears serve as a similar cipher. And the cycle of body as archive, and the interpretation of bodily signs - continues to a new generation.
"Two archives brought together and similar enough that they could be switched without recognition"
I wonder how often this happens, when one archive is switched with another one of similarity but not sameness.
And I love your line that for Saleem "the truth behind the archive does not matter as much as the archive itself, or what a reading of the archive itself might imply."
How often might this be the case? This was one of my points with the archive video in that its not so much what is in the archive but rather what it can be made to say. It's less about what it says than what possibilities of "can be said" it provides.
Hey Justin,
Would it be possible to post a link from the blog to the archive video?
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