Welcome to Litsy!

Started reading this book to get a jump on August‘s #AuthorAMonth and stumbled upon this line. For Pete‘s sake. I can‘t get away from #Clarissa even when I try. 😖

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In fiction the symbolism of such a scene would have felt ponderously overweight. But real life sometimes rammed its point home just to make sure you got it.

Hitchens on LeCarre (Continued).

Christopher Hitchens on John LeCarre, Part 1 of 2.

The overrated hack writer John LeCarre was one of the writers who most vociferously spoke out against the publication of The Satanic Verses.

😂😂😂

(Continued)...to have the courage of his convictions.

This doesn't surprise me at all considering the fact that the entire Bush crime family are only semi-literate, at best.

(Continued)...from it. Strong ideas welcomed dissent. "He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skill," wrote Edmund Burke. "Our antagonist is our helper." Only the weak and the authoritarian turned away from their opponents and called them names and sometimes wished to do them harm.

(Continued)...genius could not be suppressed. Those were the days, when artists could be defended by kings because they were good at what they did. These were lesser times.

(Continued)...the water you were in really was. And you knew that you never wanted to be there again.

Great sentence.

(Continued)...cement. "So that mosque is being built on your book," Clarissa said.

If one spent five years of one's life struggling with a large and complex project, trying to wrestle it to the ground, trying to bring it under control, and give it all the shapely beauty his talent allowed--and if, when it came out, it was received in this ugly, distorted way, then maybe the effort wasn't worth it. If this is what he got for his best effort, then he should perhaps try doing something else.

(Continued)...what was meant by the much repeated phrase 'He did it on purpose.' Well, of course he had done it on purpose. How would one write a quarter of a million words by accident?

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I just started re-reading Rushdie's autobiography, Joseph Anton, which is one of my all-time favorite books. I've been wanting to read it again since last month's unfortunate stabbing.

Don‘t know if this link will work but it‘s an interesting piece about housing and community for exiled writers. I had no idea… https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/02/opinion/salman-rushdie-free-speech-writers.ht...

Rushdie's stabbing angers me beyond words. His autobiography, "Joseph Anton" is one of my all-time favorite books. At one point, he started to let his guard down. He shouldn't have.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/12/nyregion/salman-rushdie-attacked.html

Fuck

#OnThisDay in 1989, Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa calling on Muslims to execute Salman Rushdie over publication of his novel, The Satanic Verses. A committed leftist, who saw his role as author "as including the function of antagonist to the state" Rushdie was no stranger to controversy, but he never expected the level of backlash he received for this one. The tagged is Rushdie's memoir of this time. #HistoryGetsLIT