Ah ah ah. I see him. Oh oh. Oh. Not bad. Mm. For more than 10 years, Salman Rushdie was a hunted man living and hiding with a false identity and under Police Protection. The fatwas calling for his execution was issued in 1989 following the publication of his book, the satanic verses which was considered blasphemous. With the thread of death hanging over him rushed, he changed his address 56 times during those 10 years and was the target of some 20 assassination attempts . Ah, ah, but thats all behind him. Now. Rusty has left england and settled in new york where he has lived for almost 20 years. Ah, ah, ah. I was born in what was then called monday in india in june 947. Thats to say exactly 8 weeks to the day before the end of the british empire. My father used to tell this joke, which i think he told slightly too many times about how i was born. And 8 weeks later the british ran away. August 15th 1940 joyce item of my childhood as being very happy i came from a non observant muslim, timely you know that religions many werent a big issue and no was nationality. So in the little neighborhood where we lived there were, i would, my childhood friends were of every possible religion, you know, they were hindu muslim sake, christian and all of that seem completely normal. And that sense of it, of everybody else. Is it culture being available to us . You know, was one of the great things about growing up them like many children i was told bedtime stories by my parents. My father would tell us, i mean the east, the indian equivalent of fairytales, the irregular night stories. Actually, when you read the 1001 nights you realize that its not at all the childrens book. Its full of sex. But of course, my father gave me his brushes, adaptations which interested me to read when i grew up to read the real thing. And that was influential to i never had any idea of what to do with my life except me, the writing. So when the, even when i was a child, my parents afterwards told me that when their friends asked them asked me, what do you want to do when you grow up . I would not say that i want to be a you know, Airline Pilots or a astronaut. I would say i want to be around it. This is, and i was like, i dont know, 910 years old. So it was always the plan. I never really had to plan b. Ah, i did start rising little things. My memory of the 1st story i ever wrote is that i went to see the movie, the wizard of oz. And i came home and wrote a story called over the rainbow. Is a story about a boy like myself in a city like monday, and he meets magical creatures anyway, but i mean, it was long, it was a few pages long and, and my father said that he would have his secretary type it up. So he that he did and then he said, you know, if i give this to you, youre going to lose it. So i will look after it. So he took it away and then he lost it. My parents, they still thought that an english education in europe in england was the best thing they could offer me. But nobody forced me. You know enough to say, my father said to me, would i be interested to go . But if i said no, then i didnt have to go. So they left the decision to me. My mother was completely against the idea. She didnt want me to go. But she also left the decision to me. And. And the strange thing is that i was very happy as i said growing up in bombay. You know, i, i liked the world of my childhood. I liked my school, you know, i had plenty of friends. And its very hard to understand about that. Young boy, who was what . 1212 and a half years old when this question was asked. And why did he say yes, he wanted to go, you know, and it seems mysterious to me that i made that decision. And it suggests that there was, i dont know, some spirit of adventure, some desire to go away and see other things, you know. And maybe it was in part inspired by reading. But its like that id read all these english childrens books, you know. And so i had a picture of england in my mind, which of course was completely inaccurate. England is not like a childrens book. When i arrived, i was the 1st of all that was very cold. Arrived in winter, january and i was a boy from the tropics. So, so just the physical fact of how cold it was was difficult. And then i discovered more disappointing things fighting than which was to put it in a simple word, racism. You know, that it was the 1st time in my life that i had had the feeling been given the feeling of being the other of being the person who is not like the people who are there and, and disliked for that reason. Boys find all sorts of ways of being nasty to other boys. Thats true. But the way they found being nasty to me was to attack me for my racial origins. And that was i was very shocking. It was very shocking. I didnt speak english with an english accent, and yes, i mean my skin color is relatively light. And so it means that over the years, i, in many ways suffered less racial prejudice than, than other people that my background, you know, but it was all around, you know, in the back period of, after i graduated, i graduated in 1968 and you know, the, the seventys and eightys in england were a time of considerable racial tension. Well, i had a very bad start as a writer. You know, when i Left University, because i decided to settle in england and not go back east. I think i was very confused about my identity as a writer. What kind of writer i was who exactly. I was as a roger and, and so a lot of the things that i wrote to begin with were were flawed because of that. They were, they were they werent very good as working as a advertising copywriter to pay the wrench. And then i was writing these various other projects, probably 3 book length manuscripts that, that i wrote in that in that time that, that whenever published. And i mean, actually now im very grateful. They would not publish it would really not very good. So there was a lot of work and failure. I published one novel that essentially nobody liked various other abandoned projects. So i really felt that i was, i hadnt found my ways, and i think the question in the end was that i had to do much more interest section i to really understand who i was and where the writer was coming from. And, and out of that came a desire to reclaim what i feared might be last territory, which was, which was the world id come from to the world it monday in india. And, and so i went back there with my, my small savings. And i just decided im going to stay here as long as i can. Im going to travel as widely as i can. Im going to just try and you know, drink this in again. And i was there for almost quite not quite 6 months and 5 and a half months, Something Like that. And by the time i came back, i had a much clearer idea of what i wanted to do. And out of that came in my children, what the book is about is about my generation, which is the generation of, of freedom, the declaration of independence. You know, the, the 1st generation to be born in india, not under colonial rule. You know, for over 200 years the british left on, on august the midnight of august 14th 15th and yes, thats what i wanted to write about. And so by the time i came round to writing midnights children, i, i really thought this is a kind of last chance. Know if, if, if i can, if i cant make this work, that maybe i should stop. But fortunately, thats not what happened. It did change my life, the success of midnights children. It was completely unexpected. I Left University in 1968 and by the time midnights children was published up 1981 the idea that it would become this got to global phenomena, but selling multiple millions of copies and translated into, you know, 50 languages. So, and i would never have crossed my mind that that would happen and resting with the vain winner, brilliant book, which is of them obviously funny, novel so it was a complete shock. And yes, then what it did was allowed me to live by my writing. And then i was what i was 34 years old at the time i rushed, he spent 5 years writing the satanic verses at the time. No one could foresee the rise of islamic fundamentalism. But the backlash that followed the books release was the harbinger of what was to become the dominant issue of the 21st century. The spread of fanatical is long before the satanic verses was published, rushdie asked a few friends to read the proofs. His publisher said that rusty had no idea the storm of the satanic verses was about to unleash the thing is i did show it to them booked a number of people who knew who knew the world as writing about. And it was quite obvious that people of conservative religious views would not like the book, but there they hadnt like anything else. I wrote either. So thats not particularly different. I felt that in many ways it was my most formally ambitious book. You know, it was a book where i was pushing things father that i pushed them before. And i, i like that about it. Now. The book tells of 2 passengers on a flight to london, approved and sell a dean, fall victim to a terrorist attack. As their plane explodes and they fall from the sky, the 2 protagonists are transformed into archangels of good and evil. The book denounces the oppression of women, intolerance and violence and questions. The core tenants of the islamic faith in one scene, prostitutes working in a brothel, take the names of the wives of the prophet in order to boost their earnings. And in a thinly veiled reference to either toler khomeini. The novel also depicts an exiled mom who during revolution returns to his home country and tyrannized as the people i knew about the rise of islamic fundamentalism. In fact, theres a character in the satanic verses who is, who is, you know, who is of that kind. Who is a fundamentalist preacher. I think anyone who comes from the east, who had paid attention to what was happening in the world, we knew about that and, and the only written now a lot of people who read the book say that it seems to have foreseen what was going to happen but it wasnt foreseeing, it was just Pay Attention to what was actually happening, which about time people in the west, were not paying attention. I use this metaphor of Alfred Hitchcocks film, the birds because theres, theres the scene in the birds where there are children singing in a classroom and outside the classroom. Theres the playground, but theres a, theres a planning, frame jungle gym and, and film cuts back and forth between the 2. And the 1st time it looks outside the window. You see one blackwood come to sit on the frame and then you go back in children singing and then you go back out and theres like 500. And, and the point is that when theres just one bird sitting there, doesnt mean anything. Its just a bird sitting on a flaming frame. Its only retrospectively when there are 500 birds that you begin to think. Oh yeah, there was that 1st mud. And i think what happened the case of what happened to the satanic, this is its it for Something Like the 1st mud in september 9, 988. The publication of the satanic verses caused an instant uproar in the muslim community. It criticized what they saw as rustys irreverent portrayal of the prophet. The book triggered a wave of protests across the arab world. I mean attacks like this against books had taken place before against other writers in the muslim world. G, my food, for example, and nobel laureate, well, i think what happened in the west as of people were completely taken by surprise. There was some argument about the book. There was some in england and particular there was some muslim priests who spoke up against it. And thats more or less what would have happened had not been intervention for me. Book came out in september 1988. And the fact that was 6 months later, very much in a light. On february 14th, 989 into iran, the spiritual leader of the mama revolution, ayatollah hominy, issued a religious decree, or thought was ordering all muslims to kill the British Indian rider. Salman rushdie and his publishers for the books blasphemous attacks on islam the prophet and the koran. A bounty of 25000. 00 was offered to any runny and who carried out the sentence and 7500. 00 to any muslim of another nationality. He said, in the name of god almighty, i call on all zealous muslims to execute them quickly wherever they may find them, so that no one else will dare insult islamic sanctity. I was at home in london and telephone rang and it was a woman from the b, b. C. From the news radio news program. Who i think what she said is how does it feel to know that youve been sentenced to death by the local lady . The 1st i heard of it and i said something stupid like it doesnt feel very good and put the phone down. And then i did something even more stupid just to run around the house, looking the doors and windows, as if that would be fine. My 1st thought was, i think, i think im a dead man. I think i begun to think that my days might be numbered in less than double figures the at the time, nobody understood exactly what it might mean. I had to go with a Television Interview for Cbs Television in america and. And i was asking the journalist, cbs office in london, what do you think this means . And, and one of them said, oh, dont worry about it. You know . So mainly he said this is the president of the United States to death every friday. So so nobody knew whether to take it seriously or not. But i did that, i think within 24 hours, the british had also decided that they had to take the seriously and, and thats when the protection was offered and i accepted his literary agent. Andrew wiley remembers rustys call, wildly said i had to ask him what a fun one was. Id never heard the word before. He said he was going into hiding right away. The over the next few weeks, demonstrations against rushdie escalated across britain. Muslim communities help book burnings thousands of protesters who considered the book evil and insulting to is one demanded that it be banned. The day in london activists burned effigies of the altar while chanting allah is great and death to rusty. A professor of islamic stud, he spoke out against rusty in an open letter to the International Herald tribune. Your western readers are unable to gauge the acuteness of the blow. You have delta us, he wrote. What do you think the response of black americans would be if you were to mock Martin Luther king junior or the reaction of the Jewish Community . If you eulogies, hitler. Ah, like bill you saw the director of the Islamic Center and his librarian were murdered to night on the premises of the mosque of brussels. Meet the abdulla, ill a doll and had apparently taken a moderate stance in russia. Farrell, they moved the lay sombre deal. Not a fear was d like delta. So the director of the Islamic Center abdulla ala gall was found dead, with gunshot wounds to the head, and the neck selling salim elbow hare was killed in a similar fashion. He was head of the Islamic Center library, so he said the tv is full of blood lust. Im not at the hotel anymore. I am in this unnameable place. There is weaponry everywhere. The moment when things really changed me was when i saw Television Coverage of the burning of this i thought of it them. I think one of the most obscene images that ive ever witnessed. When for me into being that the, that the narrative changed. The because i say what i thought of him had up to that point when an argument turned into something much more dangerous. The britain whose biggest bookseller withdrew the satanic verses from its 430 stores. On the same day, the writer stephen king called the head of the chain and gave him an ultimatum. If you dont sell the satanic verses you dont sell, stephen king. The book was back on the shelves the next day. Ah, there was some political problems which is that the government in england was aware of the fact that i had been a strong critic of the federal government. And so they werent particularly in love with me. But on the other hand, they offered the Police Protection and maintained it. Today, a protest took place in paris with banners reading kill, rushed in it. Not that got one more latino bush. Im death to rusty and akbar or got his grade were chanted between the band plus the latter to be metro station by about a 1000 demonstrators, by your immediate manifesto for them and rushed. The book was a stab in the back, but not all politicians and intellectual supported rusty john mccary wrote in the guardian that nobody has a god given right to insult a great religion and be published with impunity. The beloved childrens author raw doll leveled the harshest attack. This kind of sensationalism does indeed get an indifferent book on the top of the best seller list. He seems to be regarded as some sort of a hero. To my mind, hes a dangerous opportunist. Even jimmy carter, whose presidency was destroyed by Ayatollah Khomeini, denounced the book, calling it an insult to the sacred beliefs of our muslim friends and the singer cat stevens, who converted to islam in 1977 express disapproval of rustys writings and support for the death sentence another critic, Prince Charles said, im sorry, but if some one insults some one elses deepest convictions, well then you shouldnt pretend to be surprised. A few years later, his mother, Queen Elizabeth the 2nd nighted rushdie for his service to literature. Effigies of the queen and the author were burned at several demonstrations. On june, 3rd, 1989 Ayatollah Khomeini died in tehran, leaving the fatwas in place. His successor, Ayatollah Khomeini declared, it is incumbent on every muslim to employ every thing he has to send Salman Rushdie to hell. Even if it means sacrificing his life. Oh, death sentence against solomon rusty pronounced a year ago by our tools hominy has been reaffirm by his successor, ayatollah ali hummer. Nay. Irans religious leader referred to the british writer mister rusty as the author of the blasphemous book, the satanic verses. They found that islamic fanatics continue to pursue Salman Rushdie, the author of the satanic verses condemned to death by khomeini. He is in hiding somewhere in england, protected by scotland yard, got on his translators, have also become targets. We foresee a 1st attack took place earlier in the week in italy, and a 2nd one has now occurred in japan that what was general it