Useless things: keys to cities and knighthoods from the queen.
After getting his knighthood, a young girl asked him: "How’s the knight thing going?"
On Dickens: Some writers are good speakers but it kills them.
Novels once brought people the news. Novelists were committed social activists.
What about now? The more ways there are to get the news, the less news there is in it.
Example: the news was responsible for the strange transformation of Paris Hilton from a second rate hotel to a second rate human.
Example: Consider difference between news in books like The Kite Runner and Reading Lolita in Tehran and news of bombings and explosions, which we get in the paper.
Greatest myth is ordinary life. Consider your family. We say that everything is fine but we know that things are hell in there.
On Politics: "Sorry, Republicans. You had 8 years, now its not your turn."
Writers are in the front line of the quarrel with tyrants.
On suppression of events: Simply saying that this happened becomes a political act.
The Ayatollah: I don't have much to say about the Ayatollah Kohmeni, but I should point out that one of us is dead.
Example of how the state had not just imagination but also sense of humor: this letter has not been censored.
Of Saul Bellow, when asked why American writers don’t address US power: He drew himself up to his full Nobel laureate height. Writers don't have obligations. They have inspirations.
Austen’s career coincided with Napoleonic Wars and never mentioned then once.
The effect of extraneous events on lives now important. Thinking of the Bridge of San Luis Rey, where a random act killed 5 people, and Wilder ponders why these 5?
Public life intrudes on private life. September 11 is a huge example of people’s fate being unrelated to their character.
But relying on external events dates your book.
On stories: We tell each other stories to make sense of things.
A priest acquaintance, of last rites: People tell their story on their deathbed, and the priest is a receiver of stories. Controlling the story is a crime against humanity.
Regarding response to Satanic Verses: One critic said he had not read it. “He didn't need to wade through a gutter to know it contains filth. I thought this was a good point about gutters.”
Another critic, but after some time passed: “I read your book and don't know what the fuss was about.” Rushdie’s response: “Yes, asshole but you are the ones making the fuss.”
On a movie made about him post Satanic Verses: I felt the fashion insult very keenly: vermillion safari suits, aubergine safari suits, cerise safari suits. “At the end of the film I get killed personally by God.”
The defense of free speech begins with speech you don't like.
From Bellow: open the universe a little bit more.
More on opening the universe: Throughout history, artists have tried to push out to open the universe and people have always been outside pushing back.
Japanese translator of Satanic Verses was murdered. Norwegian publisher took 3 bullets in the back. Italian translator stabbed. Anonymous threats to bookstores and clerks. Rushdie apologized to the Norwegian, who replied that they had ordered a new printing. People resisted with spirit.
Purity is a dangerous ideology. Whenever somebody talks about purity, people die.
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1 comment:
Thank you, thank you, thank you for these comments. I wasn't writing and was hoping somebody was. I thought it was an amazing talk. What an intelligent, thoughtful mind. It is such a hopeful thing for humanity to be reassured that there are still some thinkers in the world. I feel the same sort of reassurance and inspiration from Obama.
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