Ville Kokko answers “Does anyone else think Mr. Simmons...”

Gordon Grant asked this question about Song of Kali:

Does anyone else think Mr. Simmons demonstrates a streak of racism in this book? The uniformly vile description of India and all the people he encounters there in contrast to the idyllic visions of Vermont, Colorado and his lovable, New Yorker friend Abe leaves a sour, xenophobic taste in my mouth.

Ville Kokko His use of many real-life quotes about how evil Calcutta is seems to suggest that he wants to make the case that it is an evil place in real life as w…moreHis use of many real-life quotes about how evil Calcutta is seems to suggest that he wants to make the case that it is an evil place in real life as well. It's like he's saying "I'm not making this up, you know." There is also an exchange of dialogue that seems to be meant to communicate the view (which is expressed by one of the participants and comes across the more reasonable one) that some cultures are inferior to others. (To that I would say that it would make sense to judge individual cultural practices, but judging whole cultures instead goes into a whole different kind of discussion, more attitudes than reason.) So he does seem to be expressing a negative view of at least Calcutta. In some broad sense, such a view would be called racism, although it could be motivated simply by eg. dislike of Calcutta specifically. I think he could have written the same story without giving such an impression, at least to me. For example, cut down on the real life quotes and it would seem more plausibly like fictional hyperbole that is to be understood as such.

Mind you, I should say that reading all these different interpretations by different readers in the reviews makes me wary of judging how this "really" is, especially when it's been a while since I read the book.(less)

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