The Ground Beneath Her Feet

拉什迪第六部小说，与U2一首歌曲同名，歌词由拉什迪撰写。

The Ground Beneath Her Feet is Salman Rushdie's sixth novel. Published in 2000, it is a variation on the Orpheus/Eurydice myth with rock music replacing Orpheus' lyre. The myth works as a red thread from which the author sometimes strays, but to which he attaches an endless series of references.

The book, while at its core detailing the love of two men, Ormus Cama and Umeed "Rai" Merchant (the narrator of the story), for the same woman, Vina Apsara, provides a background and alternate history to the entire 1950s-1990s period of the growth of rock music. The minor characters of the story are particularly interesting, as they provide the most vivid portraits of the cultures and backgrounds that come into play in the story. Defined by Toni Morrison as "a global novel", the book sets itself in the wide frame of Western and post-colonial culture, through the multilingualism of its characters, the mixture of East and West and the great number of references that span from Greek mythology, European philosophy and contemporaries such as Milan Kundera and the stars of rock'n roll.

The title is taken from a song from the novel, composed by Ormus Cama after Vina's death. The lyrics to the song, with minor changes, were adapted and recorded by U2. The song was used in the film The Million Dollar Hotel, and the promotional music video featured Rushdie in a cameo appearance.