Haroun and the Sea of Stories

Bezaban is an idol that the people in Chupwala are forced to worship. The idol is carved from black ice. The word Bezaban comes from the Hindustani words meaning “without a tongue,” symbolizing Khattam-Shud’s commitment to enforcing mandatory silence on the people of Chup. After the final battle, the idol falls onto Khattam-Shud, killing him and providing the reader with a sense of poetic justice.

Kahani—a word that translate as “story”—is the second moon of earth. It moves so quickly that astronomical instruments cannot detect it. Kahani is a land of imagination, much of which is covered by the Ocean of the Streams of Story. Kahani is split into two divisions: the land of Gup is bright, and the land of Chup is totally dark. Many of the characters in Kahani have counterpoints back on earth. For instance, Mr. Butt, who drives the mail coach, has much in common with the mechanical bird, Butt the Hoopoe. Khattam-Shud is a parallel of Mr. Sengupta, who has an affair with Haroun’s mother. Kahani is a symbol of fiction and the fantastical.