Haroun And The Sea Of Stories: A Literary Analysis

Storytelling is crucial to everyone, as it is apart of every society around the world. This is shown strongly throughout Salmon Rushdie's book, Haroun and the Sea of Stories where story is used to teach, warn and entertain people and without it the world is a very dull place. In the real world everyone from politician's like Mr.Buttoo to father's like Rashid Khalifia, use stories to control and entertain the people surrounding them .

Storytelling is a critical part of a politicians survival and livelihood in Haroun and the sea of stories since they rely on the storytellers to persuade and convince people to vote for them. The stories and the truths revealed through storytelling are the people's way of judging a politicians character and trustworthiness. This is evident when the narrator says, "Nobody ever believed anything a politico said...So the politicos needed Rashid to help them win people's votes"

They dislike story and try to spread their hate to everyone with ears, telling the world their negative opinion of stories and storytellers. People like Mr. Sengupta, from Haroun and the Sea of Stories, interpret fiction as useless, they feel that, “life is not a story book or a joke shop. All this fun will come to no good” (Rashid 20). Mr. Sengupta feels that stories are nothing but a waste of time, that they provide no substance or use to the real world, and fails to see the happiness they fill people with. Those who hate story are like poison, infecting everyone with doubt and gloom to battle the happiness story brings its patrons. This poison touched Haroun when Mr. Sengupta asked, “Whats the use of stories that aren’t even true” (Rashid 20)? Haroun began to doubt his father as the poison seeped deeper into his mind, and began to wonder about the relevance of story entirely. These people, with their poisoned tongues and hateful airs are the greatest weakness of storytellers and stories