Who: Paul Auster, Reginald Dwayne Betts, Tina Brown, Kiran Desai, Andrea Elliott, Amanda Foreman, A. M. Homes, Siri Hustvedt, Hari Kunzru, Colum McCann, Douglas Murray, Andrew Solomon, Gay Talese, more
What: Public reading of Salman Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses
Where: The New York Public Library, Fifth Ave. and Forty-Second St., and online
When: Friday, August 19, free, 11:00 am
Why: “‘To be born again,’ sang Gibreel Farishta tumbling from the heavens, ‘first you have to die. Ho ji! Ho ji! To land upon the bosomy earth, first one needs to fly. Ta-taa! Taka-thun! How to ever smile again, if first you won’t cry? How to win the darling’s love, mister, without a sigh? Baba, if you want to get born again . . .’”
So begins Salman Rushdie’s 1988 Booker Prize finalist and Whitbread winner, The Satanic Verses, which famously led the Ayatollah Khomeini to issue a fatwa on the Indian-born British-American novelist, calling for his death, complete with a multimillion-dollar bounty. While others associated with the publication of the book have indeed been murdered (Italian translator Ettore Capriolo, Japanese translator Hitoshi Igarashi; Norwegian publisher William Nygaard and Turkish translator Aziz Nesin survived attacks), Rushdie spent years in hiding but ultimately emerged to become a leading international literary figure. But on August 12, Rushdie was stabbed ten times as he prepared to give a talk and lecture at the Chautauqua Institution; the alleged assailant, twenty-four-year-old Hadi Matar, claims to have read only two pages of The Satanic Verses but decided to try to kill Rushdie after watching numerous speeches of his on YouTube.
Rushdie, who has been writing and speaking about human rights and free speech around the world for decades, will be celebrated on August 19 at 11:00 am when a group of his friends and colleagues gather on the steps of the New York Public Library in Midtown for a public reading of his most famous book; there was also a public reading of the work a few days after the fatwa was declared, some thirty-three years ago. Organized by PEN, the NYPL, PenguinRandom House, and House of SpeakEasy, “Stand with Salman: Defend the Freedom to Write” will include such authorial stalwarts as Paul Auster, Reginald Dwayne Betts, Tina Brown, Kiran Desai, Andrea Elliott, Amanda Foreman, A. M. Homes, Siri Hustvedt, Hari Kunzru, Colum McCann, Douglas Murray, Andrew Solomon, and Gay Talese. The grassroots event is open to all and will be livestreamed as well; in addition, you can post your own reading of a short passage on social media using #StandWithSalman and tagging @penamerica.
“We are again facing a watershed moment,” Foreman wrote in a statement. “The war against freedom of expression is gaining strength. Globally, over two thousand writers and journalists have been murdered since Rushdie was sentence to death by Iran. On August 19 we have an opportunity to make a stand: courage breeds courage.”