What are the motifs in Shame by Salman Rushdie?

Literature is a recurring idea in the book. Shame is a highly literary novel. One protagonist, Omar Khayyam Shakil, is named for the famous Persian poet, whose most famous work, the Rubaiyat, is better known and appreciated in English than in the original. Ironically, Omar is destined for a life of science rather than literature; his half-brother, Babar, 20 years younger and never met, writes erotic poetry interspersed with bile about his years growing up in his brother's shadow. Babar dies a political terrorist, very much not in keeping with his heroic name. Translation as a literary and a sociological process is explored in an author's aside. Other literary works are mentioned by name or discussed in the novel, including Nikolai Erdman's The Suicide, Nicolo Machiavelli's The Prince and Georg Büchner's drama Danton's Death.