His crime? To have written a novel called The Satanic Verses, which was accused of being “against Islam, the Prophet and the Quran.” For the first time he heard the word fatwa.

On February 14, 1989, Valentine’s Day, Salman Rushdie was telephoned by a BBC journalist and told that he had been “sentenced to death” by the Ayatollah Khomeini. OL17821862W Page_number_confidence 93.10 Pages 666 Partner Innodata Ppi 300 Rcs_key 24143 Republisher_date 20200721110140 Republisher_operator Republisher_time 1140 Scandate 20200708030528 Scanner Scanningcenter cebu Scribe3_search_catalog isbn Scribe3_search_id 9780224093972 Tts_version 4.NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY What happened to Salman Rushdie was the first act of a drama that is still unfolding.-From publisher descriptionĪccess-restricted-item true Addeddate 12:03:47 Boxid IA1882811 Camera Sony Alpha-A6300 (Control) Collection_set printdisabled External-identifier He shares the sometimes grim, sometimes comic realities of living with armed policemen, and the close bonds he formed with his protectors of his struggle for support and understanding from governments, intelligence chiefs, publishers, journalists, and fellow writers and of how he regained his freedom. How do a writer and his family live with the threat of murder for over nine years? How does he go on working? How does despair shape his thoughts and actions, and how does he learn to fight back? In this memoir, Rushdie tells for the first time the story of his crucial battle for freedom of speech. Asked to choose an alias that the police could use, he thought of combinations of the names of writers he loved: Conrad and Chekhov: Joseph Anton. His crime? Writing a novel, The Satanic Verses, which was accused of being 'against Islam, the Prophet, and the Quran.' So begins the extraordinary story of how a writer was forced underground for more than nine years, moving from house to house, with the constant presence of an armed police protection team. It was the first time Rushdie heard the word fatwa. On February 14, 1989, Salman Rushdie received a call from a journalist informing him that he had been 'sentenced to death' by the Ayatollah Khomeini.

Alias joseph anton