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Salman Rushdie Quotes - Page 3

All Quotes Age Arguing Art Atheism Atheist Belief Betrayal Birth Blasphemy Censorship Challenges Character Childhood Children Choices Christianity Conflict Country Crime Criticism Culture Desire Destiny Doubt Evil Falling In Love Fate Feelings Fighting Film Free Speech Freedom Freedom Of Speech Fun Giving Growing Up Growth Hate Heart Hell History Home Honesty Human Nature Identity Imagination Islam Journey Language Liberty Life Literature Loss Love Lying Magic Memories Mountain Optimism Past Perception Perspective Pride Prophet Reading Reality Religion Revolution Running Safety Satire School Shame Silence Son Soul Speed Storytelling Struggle Study Terrorism Tolerance Values Victory Violence War Water Worry Writing

Free speech is the whole thing, the whole ball game. Free speech is life itself.

Free speech is the whole thing, the whole ball game. Free speech is life itself.

Freedom, Games, Speech

Excerpts From Rushdie's Address: 1,000 Days 'Trapped Inside a Metaphor', archive.nytimes.com. December 12, 1991.

Discovery is fun. I am incredibly open to everything.

Fun, Discovery

Fundamentalists believe that we don't believe in anything. In their view of the world, they are in possession of absolute certainties, while we are descending into decadence. We will be able to triumph over terrorism not by waging war on it, but through a conscious, fearless way of life.

War, Believe, Views

"'Terror Is Glamour'". Spiegel Interview, www.spiegel.de. August 28, 2006.

If the creative artist worries if he will still be free tomorrow, then he will not be free today.

Artist, Worry, Creative

"On Censorship" by Salman Rushdie, www.newyorker.com. May 11, 2012.

'The Satanic Verses' was denied the ordinary life of a novel. It became something smaller and uglier: an insult.

Ordinary, Satanic, Insult

Salman Rushdie (2012). “Joseph Anton”, p.115, Random House

The history of a culture can be determined by its untranslatable words.

Culture, Determined

So India’s problem turns out to be the world’s problem. What happened in India has happened in God’s name. The problem’s name is God.

Names, India, World

"Religion, as ever, is the poison in India's blood" by Salman Rushdie, www.theguardian.com. March 8, 2002.

Books choose their authors; the act of creation is not entirely a rational and conscious one.

Book, Writing, Creation

Salman Rushdie (1990). “In good faith”, Penguin (Non-Classics)

Reality is a question of perspective; the further you get from the past, the more concrete and plausible it seems - but as you approach the present, it inevitably seems more and more incredible.

Time, Past, Reality

Salman Rushdie (2010). “Midnight's Children”, p.229, Random House

If you take a look at history, you will find that the understanding of what is good and evil has always existed before the individual religions. The religions were only invented by people afterwards, in order to express this idea.

Order, Ideas, People

"Terror Is Glamour". "Spiegel" Interview, www.spiegel.de. August 28, 2006.

Go for broke. Always try and do too much. Dispense with safety nets. Take a deep breath before you begin talking. Aim for the stars. Keep grinning. Be bloody-minded. Argue with the world. And never forget that writing is as close as we get to keeping a hold on the thousand and one things--childhood, certainties, cities, doubts, dreams, instants, phrases, parents, loves--that go on slipping , like sand, through our fingers.

Dream, Stars, Writing

Salman Rushdie, Michael Reder (2000). “Conversations with Salman Rushdie”, p.11, Univ. Press of Mississippi

Between the adored and the adorer falls the shadow.

Fall, Shadow

The mistake of the West was to put the Sauds on the throne of Saudi Arabia and give them control of the world's oil fortune, which they then used to propagate Wahhabi Islam.

Mistake, Oil, Giving

‘There is no right not to be offended’ by Mukund Padmanabhan, www.thehindu.com. October 6, 2012.

Once you put a thought into the world, it can be disagreed with, but it can't be unthought.

World

Now I know what a ghost is. Unfinished business, that's what.

Unfinished Business, Ghost, Unfinished

"The Satanic Verses". Book by Salman Rushdie, September 1988.

One of the strange things about violent and authoritarian regimes is they don't like the glare of negative publicity.

Negative, Publicity, Strange

"The Art of Bravery: An Interview with Salman Rushdie". Interview with Shaun Randol, lareviewofbooks.org. April 25, 2013.

In general, writers shouldn't be killed for what they write, though I can think of exceptions.

Writing, Thinking, Exception

"'Everybody needs to get thicker skins'". Interview with Stuart Jeffries, www.theguardian.com. July 10, 2008.

Religion is responsible for a lot of the problems in the history of the world and it's not something that I practice or recommend, but to each his own.

Inspirational, Life, Practice

Sometimes when you finish a book, you don't know quite what you've got.

Book, Sometimes, Knows

Realism can break a writer's heart.

Heart, Break, Realism

Your blasphemy, Salman, can't be forgiven. To set your words against the Words of God.

God, Forgiven, Word Of God

The Satanic Verses pt. 6 (1988)

With death comes honesty.

Death, Honesty

Salman Rushdie (1989). “The Satanic Verses”, New York, N.Y. : Viking

All names mean something.

Mean, Names

Salman Rushdie (1990). “Haroun and the Sea of Stories”, Penguin Books

Literature is the one place in any society where, within the secrecy of our own heads, we can hear voices talking about everything in every possible way.

Talking, Voice, Literature

"Is Nothing Sacred?" (1990)

Even the Islam stuff I thought was pretty respectful about Islam in a funny way. I mean, yes, from a secular point of view, but it talks about the birth of this religion, and I thought it was pretty admiring of the person at the center of it, the prophet of Islam.

Mean, Views, Islam

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