• Saving America
• Jan Garden Castro (bio)

Quichotte (pronounced key-shot) stirs up endless questions as Rushdie's "fiction" mirrors 2020 world events: the Black Lives Matter movement has blasted the lid off of racism in America and worldwide as targeted violence against non-whites makes headlines. In another direction, drug companies who bribe doctors to overprescribe opioids are being prosecuted: John Kapoor is the first drug company CEO convicted of criminal schemes to induce doctors to hook patients on an addictive form of fentanyl and Purdue Pharma has pleaded guilty and paid eight billion dollars—but so far no Sackler family members have been jailed. (Because they are white?) Quichotte fictionalizes Kapoor and addresses the big story that opioid suicide and overdose deaths in the United States have risen from 21,000 in 2010 to 70,237 in 2017, according to CDC and the NIH (National Institute on Drug Abuse) statistics. Enter Miss Salma R, a strong-willed Indian ex-pat and TV host who becomes a fentanyl addict.

Rushdie's cautionary yet hopeful metafiction cloaks hard truths about racism and addiction in America in a tale purportedly written by a second-rate writer named Sam DuChamp or Brother, who explains it this way to his son:

He tried to explain the picaresque tradition, its episodic nature, and how the episodes of such a work could encompass many manners, high and low, fabulist and commonplace, how it could be at once parodic and original, and so through its metaphoric roguery it could demonstrate and seek to encompass the multiplicity of human life.

Sam's quest novel opens with allusions to Cervantes' 1505 Don Quixote, a saga in which the main character parodies those whose fantasies exceed their capabilities. First, a rambling monologue introduces the inner thoughts of Sam's fictional character Ismail Smile, who selects his own name Quichotte after remembering listening, as a boy, to his father's vinyl recording of the Jules Massenet opera Don Quichotte. In writer Sam's parallel "real" universe, his son has rejected both birth parents, now leads a cult, and wears an "original" mask from Man of La Mancha, the 1965 musical set in a prison where the fictional Cervantes is writing a fictional Don Quixote. Sam's son, or the Son of Sam, is a creepy loner involved in unspecified cult and cyber-spy activities as his character is introduced.

The main characters in the novel, both good and evil, come from Bombay or other locations in India, but all are now American citizens with varied careers: Sam is a mystery writer who invents Ismail Smile, a traveling salesman who works for his rich cousin Dr. R. K. Smile, who runs the highly profitable Smile Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a company pushing a fentanyl sublingual spray. Dr. Smile's wife Happy Smile delights in being an arts patron and helping others. Salma R., a cinema star in India who moved to New York in her mid-twenties and starred in the Five Eyes spy series, now hosts a popular TV talk show. Smile is a huge Salma fan and addicted to watching TV in general when he's on the road selling drugs. Human Trampoline is Smile's sister in New York; her story has parallels with that of Sam's sister in London. These two women are sensible, have some of the best lines, and their personalities are not as inflated as the men's. Many parallel situations in the lives of Sam the writer and Quichotte have different outcomes but start with each being estranged from his son and sister, embracing a dual American-East Indian identity, and facing unprovoked racist incidents due to their brown skin and features.

Ismail Smile, the tall, slender, older East Indian main character, reminds readers of the character Ishmael who opens Melville's Moby Dick (1851)—the only survivor of a captain's insane whale hunt. But Ismael uses an Americanized version of his Indian name, calling himself Smile Smile. Smile's cousin Dr. R. K. Smile is a charming con man who boasts he...

• 拯救美国
• 扬·卡斯特罗（Jan Garden Castro）（生物）

由于拉什迪（Rushdie）的“小说”反映了2020年的世界大事，Quichotte（带发音的镜头）激起了无休止的问题：“黑人生活问题”运动在美国和世界范围内消除了种族主义的盖子，因为针对非白人的针对性暴力成为头条新闻。在另一个方向上，行贿医生以过度开处方阿片类药物的药物公司将受到起诉：约翰·卡普尔（John Kapoor）是第一个被判犯有犯罪计划，诱使医生以芬太尼上瘾的形式吸引患者的药物公司首席执行官，普渡制药公司已认罪并支付了80亿美元。美元-但到目前为止，没有任何萨克勒家族成员入狱。（因为它们是白色的？）Quichotte根据CDC和国家药物滥用研究所（NIH）的统计，假想卡普尔的故事是虚构的，并讲述了一个大故事：美国的阿片类药物自杀和过量死亡已从2010年的21,000人上升至2017年的70,237人。输入萨尔玛·R小姐，他是一位意志坚定的印度前派和电视节目主持人，后来成为芬太尼的瘾君子。

拉什迪（Rushdie）谨慎而又充满希望的元小说掩盖了美国一位名叫萨姆·杜尚（Sam DuChamp）或二等兄弟的二流作家写的一个关于种族主义和成瘾的硬道理，他用这种方式向他的儿子解释了这个故事：

他试图解释野蛮的传统，其短剧的本质，以及这种作品的故事集如何包含许多方式，包括高低调，流浪者和平凡人，它怎么可能立即成为滑稽的和原始的，并因此通过其隐喻性的手法来体现。可以证明并试图涵盖人类生活的多样性。

萨姆的探索小说以塞万提斯（Cervantes）的1505唐吉x德（Don Quixote）的寓言开头，故事中的主角模仿那些幻想超出其能力的人物。首先，一个漫不经心的独白介绍了山姆的虚构人物伊斯梅尔·微笑（Ismail Smile）的内心思想，他回忆起小时候听了父亲父亲朱尔斯·马斯内（Jules Massenet）歌剧唐·基肖特（Don Quichotte）的黑胶唱片后，选择了自己的名字Quichotte。在作家山姆（Sam）平行的“真实”宇宙中，他的儿子拒绝了两个亲生父母，现在领导一个邪教，并戴着1965年音乐剧《曼·拉·曼恰》（Man of La Mancha）的面具，在监狱里虚构的塞万提斯（Cervantes）正在写一部虚构的小说。唐吉x德。山姆的儿子或山姆的儿子是一个令人毛骨悚然的孤独者，在介绍他的性格时，他从事未指定的邪教和网络间谍活动。

小说中的主要人物（善与恶）都来自孟买或印度其他地区，但现在都是美国公民，职业各异：山姆是一位神秘作家，他发明了伊斯梅尔·微笑（Ismail Smile），他是一位旅行推销员，为他的堂兄工作。 RK Smile博士经营着利润丰厚的Smile Pharmaceuticals，Inc.，该公司致力于推动芬太尼舌下喷雾剂的研发。Smile博士的妻子Happy Smile很高兴成为艺术赞助人并帮助他人。萨尔玛·R（Salma R.），印度电影明星，二十多岁时移居纽约，并出演了《五只眼睛》间谍系列，现在主持一个受欢迎的电视脱口秀节目。Smile是萨尔玛（Salma）的忠实粉丝，并且在出门贩毒时迷上了一般看电视的习惯。蹦床是Smile在纽约的姐姐。她的故事与山姆（Sam）在伦敦的姐姐的故事相似。这两个女人很懂事，有一些最好的路线，而且她们的性格没有男人的夸张。作家和Quichotte在Sam的生活中有许多平行的处境，结果却各有不同，但始于与儿子和姐姐之间的隔range，拥抱了美洲和东印度的双重身份，并因其棕色皮肤和特征而面临着毫无根据的种族主义事件。

伊斯梅尔·微笑（Ismail Smile）是个身材苗条，年长的东印度主要人物，使读者想起了以实玛利（Ishmael）扮演的角色，后者开了梅尔维尔（Melville）的白鲸（Moby Dick）（1851），这是上尉疯狂捕鲸的唯一幸存者。但是伊斯梅尔（Ismael）使用的是他的印度名字的美国化版本，称自己为“微笑”。Smile的堂兄RK Smile博士是一位迷人的骗子，以...