Reconstructing Identity in the Postcolonial Era – Salman Rushdie’s Saladin Chamcha

Abstract

The present paper focuses on the manner in which Salman Rushdie analyses Saladin Chamcha’s
process of identity transformation which is specific to the postcolonial era. The character of The Satanic
Verses made a choice in his childhood to follow a British cultural model and to deny his Indian roots, but the
journey to his native country helps Saladin recover his identity and the U.K. citizen Saladin Chamcha
becomes once more Salahuddin Chamchawalla, the inhabitant of the hybrid city of Bombay. At this point, the
character acts and reacts according to the pattern of the postcolonial era, reconstructing his reality and his
identity.