B(r)easts of the wild

I am currently reading William Dalrymple's City of Djinns. For anyone interested in history of India or Pakistan or the Mughal period this is a fantastic read.

There's a mention of breasts somewhere in the book, and he writes something like:

...her breasts were like ripe(Indian?) Mangoes.

I usually don't follow all the imagery I read [it's easier to get through Dan Brown that way] but this one caught me off-guard. It was a treat-- an interesting and accurate way to describe things succinctly without resorting to crude hyperbole. He could have picked avocadoes or --les artistically-- Oranges, Apples, or even (begin eyeroll sequence) Melons. There are fruits which could be have been used to describe women's bosoms. That wouldn't have been as pleasing to read though [or accurate. he's talking of Indian women] -- it had to be mangoes, and that's how it is. Great writer, this.

Dalrymple is to Delhi what Rushdie is to Bombay, and this is his love-letter to Delhi. Rushdie had Midnight's Children for Bombay and Dalrymple has City of Djinns for Delhi. His writing is not comparable to Rushdie's (he writes non-fiction, and this is his first work, from 1989) but his book(s) are still amazing reads. I wish Nepal had a chronicler of history like him.

Suggested Readings for Dalrymple:

City of Djinns
In Xanadu

PS: I have met and talked to Dalrymple (or 'Will' as Prof. Jalal, a friend of his professor of mine, calls him) and he's as funny and intelligent in real life as he is in his books.