|
Rushdie Sheds Cover for U.S. Book Tour
CHICAGO, Aug 23 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Salman Rushdie, a British author who offended Muslims worldwide with a controversial book Muslims say ridiculed Islam, has hit the road to promote his latest book, and for the first time in a dozen years is announcing his appearance dates weeks in advance, despite a death threat from Iran, a U.S. newspaper reported Thursday.
The Chicago SunTimes said that the Muslim-born author was shedding the secrecy under which he lived for years after the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a
fatwa (religious decree) calling for Rushdie's death in 1989, on the grounds that his
The Satanic Verses blasphemed Islam.
Rushdie won the Whitebread Award in 1988 for the book, his fourth novel, which was banned in India and South Africa, and burned on the streets of Bradford, England, where a large community of South Asian Muslims reside.
Several major book chains stopped selling the book, fearing their employees' safety and because of the insult towards Muslim sentiments.
Naguib Mahfouz, the Muslim winner of the 1988 Nobel Prize in Literature, criticized Khomeini for "intellectual terrorism", but changed his view later and said that Rushdie did not have "the right to insult anything, especially a prophet or anything considered holy."
In 1990, Rushdie published an essay, In Good Faith, to appease critics, and issued an apology in which he claimed to reaffirm his respect for Islam.
This time around, sponsors of his Chicago appearance made his schedule public three weeks ahead of time.
Rushdie, who will read from his new book Fury, may answer some questions and will sign copies of the book at the Harold Washington Library at 6 pm on September 7th. The library building closes at 5 pm, and people attending the Rushdie event in the Winter Garden may enter after that time through the door on Plymouth Court, the newspaper said.
Rushdie's appearance is sponsored by the library, the Guild Complex (a literary and cultural organization) and Hyde Park's Seminary Co-op Bookstores.
He will appear in eight other cities, including New York, Boston, Houston, Minneapolis, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle and Portland.
Fury is set in New York, telling the story of a professor turned wildly-successful television puppet show creator who is pursued by a gorgeous, much younger neighbor, the newspaper said.
Rushdie's new publisher, Random House, would not discuss reasons for lessened security. His literary agent, Andrew Wylie, did not return repeated calls from
the Chicago SunTimes.
"For his previous tour, the location was kept a secret. You weren't supposed to publicize the location until a few days beforehand. That's not an issue on this tour," said Leah Vaselopulos, who coordinates author events for the Chicago Public Library system.
When Rushdie appeared at the Chicago Historical Society in 1999, police officers were posted outside, metal detectors were employed, photo IDs were required and coats had to be checked.
There will be a police presence this time as well, the paper said. "Based on past experience, we're going to have a show of some force," police spokesman Sgt. Robert Cargie was quoted as saying. "Even though it's not in the news anymore, there is still concern.''
Great Britain, where Rushdie reportedly lives, and Iran decided to normalize ties in September 1998 after Tehran announced it would not seek to apply Khomeini's 1989 religious decree, which claimed that through his writings, Rushdie had renounced Islam and therefore deserved to be killed.
But efforts to distance the government from a $2.5 million reward for killing Rushdie led to the sponsoring of the Khordad Foundation, to up the ante by $300,000.
In May 1999, the two countries upgraded diplomatic ties by promoting their respective charge d'affaires to the rank of ambassador.
But in February, some conservative Iranians declared the fatwa irrevocable. The Islamic Propagation Organization asked world Muslims to "carry out this divine edict and cleanse the world of such mercenary Satans."
|
