- Understanding the controversy behind the author’s fourth novel, ‘The Satanic Verses’
By Shailendree Wickrama Adittiya
Over the weekend, literary enthusiasts closely followed news on the attack on author Salman Rushdie, whose novel Midnight’s Children is perhaps his most well-known work, but whose The Satanic Verses is his most controversial.
The attack on the author sparked conversation on the freedom of expression, given the reason behind the attack, and past incidents surrounding The Satanic Verses. Over time, Salman Rushdie has become a symbol of freedom of expression, and as several authors have claimed, the attack on Salman Rushdie is an attack on freedom of speech everywhere.
Last Friday (12), the author was attacked on stage at the Chautauqua Institution in western New York state. The stabbing left him on a ventilator, unable to speak, and Rushdie’s agent Andrew Wylie said the author may lose an eye.
On Sunday (14), Associated Press stated that Rushdie was taken off the ventilator and able to speak.
Henry Reese, the interviewer who was on stage with Rushdie, suffered a minor head injury. He is the co-founder of a non-profit organisation that provides sanctuary to writers exiled under threat of prosecution.
While the Police detained 24-year-old Hadi Matar over the crime, BBC quotes an onlooker as saying, “It took like five men to pull him away, and he was still stabbing”. The onlooker added: “He was just furious, furious. Like intensely strong and just fast.”
Given the intensity behind the attack, one does wonder why the author is so despised and by whom. Rushdie has faced threats ever since the publication of his 1988 novel, The Satanic Verses, and went into hiding for nearly 10 years.
He was born in India in 1947 and is known as a British-American author who combines magical realism with historical fiction in his work. His first novel, Grimus, was published in 1975, but was generally ignored by the public and literary critics. However, he shot to fame with his second novel, Midnight’s Children, which was published in 1981. The novel won Rushdie the Booker Prize in 1981.
In 1983, Rushdie wrote Shame, which was followed by a non-fiction book about Nicaragua, The Jaguar Smile in 1987. Next came his most controversial work, The Satanic Verses.
The Satanic Verses was inspired in part by the life of Muhammad, and many Muslims accuse Rushdie of blasphemy. Rushdie himself was born to a liberal Muslim family, but is an atheist. The Satanic Verses controversy, or the Rushdie Affair, refers to what happened with the publication of the 1988 novel, which has been banned in 13 countries, including Sri Lanka.
In January 1989, Rushdie published a column in The Observer, in which he said The Satanic Verses was not an anti-religious novel. The following month, Iran’s Supreme Leader at the time Ayatollah Khomeini proclaimed a fatwa ordering the author’s execution, and a bounty was offered for his death. Rushdie lived under police protection for several years after this, and that year, the United Kingdom and Iran broke diplomatic relations over the incident.
In 1989, Rushdie faced a failed assassination attempt in London.
Rushdie held that the book is not blasphemous, but protests were carried out, copies of the book were burnt, and there were attacks against persons associated with the translating or publishing of the book. In 1991, a Japanese translator of the book was stabbed to death. An Italian translator was stabbed, and a Norwegian publisher was shot as well, but both survived.
In 1998, Iran made a public commitment that it would neither support nor hinder assassination operations on Rushdie, as a precondition to restoring diplomatic relations with the UK.
However, in 2005, BBC reported: “Iran’s hard-line Revolutionary Guards have declared the death sentence on British author Salman Rushdie is still valid – 16 years after it was issued.” The same year, The Times reported that Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had told Muslims making the annual pilgrimage to Mecca that Rushdie was an apostate whose killing would be authorised by Islam.
In 2013, Rushdie’s name was included in a “Wanted Dead or Alive for Crimes Against Islam” list published by Inspire, a terrorist propaganda magazine published by al Qaida. Included in the list was Stéphane Charbonnier, the Charlie Hebdo publishing director and cartoonist, who was killed in a terror attack following the publication of caricatures of Muhammad.
Following the incident, Rushdie said: “Religion, a mediaeval form of unreason, when combined with modern weaponry becomes a real threat to our freedoms. This religious totalitarianism has caused a deadly mutation in the heart of Islam, and we see the tragic consequences in Paris… I stand with Charlie Hebdo, as we all must, to defend the art of satire, which has always been a force for liberty and against tyranny, dishonesty and stupidity. ‘Respect for religion’ has become a code phrase meaning ‘fear of religion.’ Religions, like all other ideas, deserve criticism, satire, and, yes, our fearless disrespect.”
In 2012, Rushdie was to appear at the Jaipur Literature Festival in India, but cancelled the event appearance and a further tour of India, saying there was a possible threat to his life.
While Rushdie has continued to publish several novels since The Satanic Verses, including The Ground Beneath Her Feet (1999), Fury (2001), and Quichotte (2019), in 2012, the author published Joseph Anton: A Memoir, an autobiographical book in the third person. Joseph Anton is the pseudonym Rushdie used while in hiding following the fatwa.
Rushdie has also received many awards and honours, including knighthood. He has been vocal about freedom of expression, and his words are being shared by readers, fellow authors, and several other persons.
“Three months ago I heard Salman Rushdie speak at the PEN World Voices Festival. He said: ‘A poem cannot stop a bullet. A novel can’t defuse a bomb… But we are not helpless… We can sing the truth and name the liars.’ We must tell better stories than the tyrants,” Hatemonger and Crux: A Cross-Border Memoir author Jean Guerrero shared.
Pen International issued a statement, saying Rushdie was the victim of an attack on free speech over his book The Satanic Verses (1988), “when Iran’s late leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a fatwa calling for Rushdie’s death, forcing him to remain in hiding for many years”.
Condemning the attack on Rushdie, PEN International President Burhan Sonmez said: “Salman is an esteemed and celebrated author, and beloved member of the PEN community, who has been facing threats for his work for years. No one should be targeted, let alone attacked, for peacefully expressing their views.”
Island of a Thousand Suns and What Lies Between Us author Nayomi Munaweera said: “Deeply saddened to hear this news. No one should be attacked for writing. We tell stories, we get on stage, this is our job, and we never know how we will be received. Sometimes, yes, it is scary. This is the nightmare scenario.”
Meanwhile, Land of the Wilted Rose, Love and Honour, and Rat Eater author Anand Ranganathan shared this quote by Rushdie: “Freedom of expression ceases to exist without the freedom to offend. Because one man’s belief is another man’s fairy tale; where there is no belief, there is no blasphemy.”
