Salman Rushdie, a Prolific Writer, Emerged from Hiding

August 13, 2022

Sir Salman Rushdie has been writing for 50 years, and because of what he writes, he has often been threatened with death.

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The author is one of the most famous and successful British writers of all time. In 1981, his second book, Midnight’s Children, won the prestigious Booker Prize. But when his fourth book, The Satanic Verses, came out in 1988, it became his most controversial work, causing international trouble on a scale that had never been seen before.

Many Muslims in the Islamic world were very angry when the book came out. They said that the way the Prophet Muhammad was portrayed was a serious insult to their faith.

Rushdie, 75, was threatened with death, so he had to go into hiding. The British government put him under police protection. Iran quickly cut off ties with the UK in protest, and the country’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, called for the novelist’s death in a fatwa, or decree, in 1989, a year after the book came out.

But in the West, authors and other smart people said that the violent response to the book was a threat to freedom of speech.

Salman Rushdie Biography

Ahmed Salman Rushdie is an Indian-born author whose allegorical novels explore historical and philosophical topics through bizarre characters, gloomy humor, and an effusive and melodramatic language style. Ahmed Salman Rushdie was born on June 19, 1947, in Bombay (now Mumbai), India. He became divisive because to how he handled delicate religious and political issues.

Rushdie was educated at Rugby School and the University of Cambridge, where he earned an M.A. in history in 1968. Rushdie’s father was a successful Muslim businessman in India. He worked as an advertising copywriter in London for the most of the 1970s. In 1975, he released Grimus, his debut book. Rushdie gained international prominence with his second book, Midnight’s Children (1981), a parable about contemporary India that surprised critics and readers alike. He wrote the screenplay for an adaption that was made into a movie and published in 2012.

Salman Rushdie Novels

Rushdie is a prolific author; among his latest works are the novels East, West (1994), The Moor’s Last Sigh (1995), The Ground Beneath Her Feet (1999), and Fury. He is also the author of Haroun and the Sea of Stories for children and the collection of essays Imaginary Homelands (2001). His short story collection are East, West (1994), and the novel The Moor’s Last Sigh (1995).

He worked on the Midnight’s Children stage adaption, which had its world premiere in 2003 in London. Shalimar the Clown, The Enchantress of Florence, Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights, The Golden House, and Quichotte are among the works he has released in the previous two decades.

Rushdie has two children and has been married four times. He now resides in the US and was knighted in 2007 for his contributions to writing by the Queen. In response to the uproar surrounding The Satanic Verses, he released a memoir of his life in 2012.

In 2002, he published Step Across This Line, a collection of essays he had written between 1992 and 2002 on topics like the September 11 attacks and The Wizard of Oz. The Enchantress of Florence (2008), based on a fictitious biography of the Mughal emperor Akbar, and Shalimar the Clown (2005), an exploration of terrorism that was predominantly set in the contentious Kashmir region of the Indian subcontinent.

Awards

In 1981, Rushdie won the Booker Prize for Midnight’s Children. Later, the book was awarded the Best of the Booker (1993) and the Booker of Bookers (1993). (2008). The public cast votes for these special awards to mark the 25th and 40th anniversaries of the prize, respectively. Rushdie received a knighthood in 2007, an honor that the parliaments of Pakistan and Iran disapproved of. In 2016, he attained U.S. citizenship.

Salman Rushdie Attacked on lecture stage in New York

Salman Rushdie was stabbed in the neck and abdomen on Friday by a man who stormed the stage as the author was ready to deliver a lecture in western New York. The author’s book “The Satanic Verses” attracted death threats from Iran’s government in the 1980s.

Rushdie was rushed to a hospital where he had surgery while covered in blood. His agent, Andrew Wylie, reported that the author was on a ventilator on Friday night with a damaged liver, severed arm nerves, and an eye he was likely to lose.

Hadi Matar, 24, of Fairview, New Jersey, was the assailant, according to the police. He was detained on the spot and was being held until his arraignment. Ten years after the release of “The Satanic Verses,” Matar was born. Maj. Eugene Staniszewski of the State Police said it was unknown what motivated the attack.

Writers and politicians condemn attack on Salman Rushdie

While Salman Rushdie is still in the US being treated with a ventilator, authors and politicians have denounced the attack on the novelist. In their statements of support, British politicians supported free speech, including Prime Minister Boris Johnson and leadership hopeful Rishi Sunak.

Rushdie received death threats from Iran in the 1980s after Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a fatwa calling for his execution due to his works, which many Muslims regarded as blasphemous.