"In the land of Chup, a Shadow very often has a stronger personality than the Person, or Self, or Substance to whom or to which it is joined! So often the Shadow leads, and it is the Person or Self or Substance that follows. And of course there can be quarrels between the Shadow and the Substance or Self or Person; they can pull in opposite directions–how often have I witnessed that!–but just as often there is a true partnership, and mutual respect.

–So Peace with the Chupwalas means Peace with their Shadows, too…

[The bad guy in the story] has become more Shadowy, so his Shadow has become more like a Person. And the point has come at which it's no longer possible to tell which is his Shadow and which is his substantial Self–because he has done what no other Chupwala has ever dreamt of–that is, he has separated himself from his Shadow! He goes about in the darkness, entirely Shadowless, and his Shadow goes wherever it wishes."

—Haroun and the Sea of Stories, Salman Rushdie, Penguin Books, 1990, p132.