Albert Einstein, while better known for his scientific philosophies, had a very positive philosophy on life.  He once said, “Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving.” At the heart of this saying is the philosophy that you have to keep moving on with your life, one day at a time.  Getting caught up in one thought or another will ultimately tip the scales, causing you to lose the balance in your life.  In Salman Rushdie’s story “The Harmony of the Spheres” in his novel East, West, Eliot Crane is a genius who eventually loses this battle for balance and harmony in his mental state, or “sphere.”  Weaving the tale of Eliot’s mental breakdown is his college friend, a man named Khan. Both men experience different kinds of disharmony in their respective spheres.

A person’s sense of harmony is not contributed merely to mental balance; it also consists of emotional and spiritual balance.  Emersion in dark topics of study, heartbreak, and betrayal are factors that lead to an imbalance of the spheres in “The Harmony of the Spheres.” Mental imbalances can be traced to chemical imbalances and genetics, yet the complete fall over the edge is likely because of an experience or behavior that simply makes things worse. For Eliot, this fall takes place when he becomes obsessed with researching the occult and the supernatural. Khan explains, “If I find it impossible to let go of Eliot’s memory, it is perhaps because I know that the seductive arcane which drove Eliot Crane out of his mind almost ensnared me as well” (137). Eliot had an obsessive passion in researching the occult when writing his novel titled The Harmony of the Spheres.  He lets his mind become absolutely consumed with his research.  This fixation on the occult is essentially what destroys the harmony of his mind. 

In previous years, Eliot “had met a demon once and ever since that day he and Lucy had been on the run” (126). The “demon” Rushdie writes of in the story may not be the evil spirits found in horror movies.  Rather, the demon represents the personal struggles Eliot wrestles with in his life.  In Eliot’s disturbed mind, he believes there is a demon living in his house, so he and his wife quickly sell it and move elsewhere.  This plan does not work; the demon follows Eliot no matter where he goes.  This is true for anyone battling with the demons in their life. Everyone has personal “demons” they are forced to deal with.  Some people think that changing their location will fix their problems, but this is never the case.  You can move thousands of miles away, but your problems will always follow you. 

You must face your demons head on to have any luck in ridding them for good.  Running away will usually only make the problem worse, or at least keep things the way they are.  Eliot chooses to run away from his demon forever, but, sadly, his method is to take his own life.

In the closing events of the story, a sudden twist occurs.  This twist shows a different “sphere” of the self that is also capable of spinning out of control. Khan says, “So here it came: the collapse of harmony, the demolition of the spheres of my heart” (146).  Khan tells of the destruction of the spheres of his heart upon hearing the truth of the relationship between his wife and Eliot Crane.  He finds out they had been having an affair behind his back while Eliot had been alive, and this fact breaks Khan’s heart.  The previous balance he had in his emotional state of being is completely destroyed when his wife tells him the truth.  He does not experience a breakdown of his mental spheres as Eliot had, but has an emotional collapse instead.

To restore harmony, one must clearly identify and accept the different struggles in their life, mind, self; denial will only lead to imbalance. With acceptance and embrace of opposite sides, a person can fully understand themselves as a whole, good and bad.

Whether it is a mental or emotional destruction of the spheres within a person, any kind of disruption of balance is harmful.  In order to overcome any kind of break down in your state of being, you must take those words of advice from Albert Einstein, and just keep moving through your life.  Getting caught up in one state of mind will only bring you down farther.  Only then can the harmony of the spheres stay in balance.