Five is a life-changing number for Salman Rushdie. The Satanic Verses was his fifth book. The Satanic Verses-which, he said, was his least political-changed his life forever. His second book, Midnight's Children, had only changed the world of English literary writing. And after four divorces, Rushdie is married again. Rachel Eliza Griffiths is his fifth go at the fuzzy feeling. But with Griffiths, the feeling is very much the 'print it on a T-shirt and wear as a slogan' kind. (He was not looking for love, he says).
A poet, Griffiths often goes by her second name. Like him. Rushdie's first name is Ahmed. (Nobody has ever called me Ahmed except my mother when she was cross with me, he writes in Knife, his much-awaited memoir after the attack on his life in 2022.) He is in love. And this time it is happiness.
Knife-Meditations After an Attempted Murder is a brave, unflinching chronicle of the attack on a writer. It is his most accessible book and certainly his most important work. Rushdie is out of hiding. He lays himself bare. He has survived, and has lived to tell the tale. There is the detailed, vivid chronicling of his own recovery. (Griffiths has a documentary, too.) Details include finding a bump during his prostate examination. (Not cancer, though they thought it was.) Then there were the urinary problems, fears of going blind, and pain. And this book about almost dying is his most life-affirming work.
His attack lasts 27 seconds. The same time it would take to recite the Lord's Prayer, if you were religious, he writes. Or read out his favourite Shakespeare's sonnet 130. "Fourteen lines of iambic pentameter, octave and sestet," he writes. He describes sitting in an amphitheatre in Chautauqua on that fateful day to talk about the importance of keeping writers safe. "My first thought when I saw this murderous shape rushing towards me was: "So it's you. Here you are," he writes.
ãã®èšäºã¯ THE WEEK India ã® May 05, 2024 çã«æ²èŒãããŠããŸãã
7 æ¥éã® Magzter GOLD ç¡æãã©ã€ã¢ã«ãéå§ããŠãäœåãã®å³éžããããã¬ãã¢ã ã¹ããŒãªãŒã8,500 以äžã®éèªãæ°èã«ã¢ã¯ã»ã¹ããŠãã ããã
ãã§ã«è³Œèªè ã§ã ?  ãµã€ã³ã€ã³
ãã®èšäºã¯ THE WEEK India ã® May 05, 2024 çã«æ²èŒãããŠããŸãã
7 æ¥éã® Magzter GOLD ç¡æãã©ã€ã¢ã«ãéå§ããŠãäœåãã®å³éžããããã¬ãã¢ã ã¹ããŒãªãŒã8,500 以äžã®éèªãæ°èã«ã¢ã¯ã»ã¹ããŠãã ããã
ãã§ã«è³Œèªè ã§ã? ãµã€ã³ã€ã³
Divides And Dividends
Contrasting narratives on the scrapping of Article 370 define the elections in Jammu and Kashmir
Playing it cool
Everybody knows what 420 means in the Indian context. But in American parlance it is something very different: four-twenty or 4/20 or April 20 denotes cannabis celebration; its cultural references are rooted in the hippie culture of the 1960s and 1970s.
The heroine's new clothes
Who else but Sanjay Leela Bhansali could bring on a wardrobe reset like the one in his just-dropped period pieceâan eight-part Netflix series called Heeramandi?
AI & I
Through her book Code Dependentâshortlisted for the Womenâs Prize for Non-FictionâMadhumita Murgia gives voice to the voiceless multitudes impacted by artificial intelligence
Untold tales from war
Camouflaged is a collection of 10 deeply researched stories, ranging from the world wars to the 26/11 terror attacks
Hair force
Sheetal Mallar, in her photobook Braided, uses hair as a metaphor to tell a story that is personal yet universal
THE WHITE TIGER GAVE ME CONFIDENCE IN MY ABILITIES
The first time Adarsh Gourav made an impression was in Ramin Bahrani's 2021 film The White Tiger, a gripping adaptation of Aravind Adiga's Booker-winning novel.
The art of political protest
The past doesnât always remain in the past. Sometimes, it emerges in the present, reminding us about the universality and repetitiveness of the human experience. Berlinâs George Grosz Museum, a tiny gem, is a startling reminder that modern political and social ills are not modern. Grosz lived through World Wars I and II, shining a torch into the heart of darkness in high-ranking men and womenâwho were complicit in the collapse of the world as they knew it.
REFUELLING DYING SATELLITES
A Chennai company is making waves in the world of space tech startups
DIVERSITY IN UNITY
THE SOUTH ASIAN COMMUNITY IN THE US HAS SEVERAL THINGS IN COMMON, BUT WHEN IT COMES TO THE UPCOMING ELECTIONS, THERE ARE WIDELY DIFFERING OPINIONS AND FEELINGS