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‘Respect for religion’ has become a code phrase meaning ‘fear of religion.’ Religions, like all other ideas, deserve criticism, satire, and, yes, our fearless disrespect.

Salman Rushdie

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Salman Rushdie
Age: 77
Born: 1947
Born: June 19
Actor
Essayist
Novelist
Screenwriter
Writer
Bombay
Rushdie
Joseph Anton
Sir Ahmed Salman Rushdie
Become
Criticism
Ideas
Deserve
Disrespect
Life
Meaning
Satire
Like
Growth
Phrase
Respect
Fearless
Religion
Religions
Fear
Phrases
Inspirational
Code

More quotes by Salman Rushdie

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I am certainly not a good Muslim. But I am able now to say that I am Muslim in fact it is a source of happiness to say that I am now inside, and a part of the community whose values have always been closest to my heart.
Salman Rushdie
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We must agree on what matters: kissing in public places, bacon sandwiches, disagreement, cutting-edge fashion, literature, generosity, water, a more equitable distribution of the world's resources, movies, music, freedom of thought, beauty, love.
Salman Rushdie
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You can't assume if you do something contentious that people will be on your side. The moment violence enters the story, the story changes. Then the question is, How do you face up to violence? And then you have to have a no-compromise position. And this is quite simply a lesson we learn in the school playground.
Salman Rushdie
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Perhaps because my relationship with my father went through such a long, bumpy time, it's been very important for me to work to try to keep lines of communication open between my sons and myself to try to avoid my father's mistakes. At least if you're making mistakes, make different mistakes.
Salman Rushdie
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What's the use of stories that aren't even true?
Salman Rushdie
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To be born again,' sang Gibreal Farishta tumbling from the heaveans, 'first you have to die. Ho ji! Ho ji! To land upon the bosomy earth, first one needs to fly Tat-taa! Takatun! How to ever smile again, if first you won't cry? How to win the darling's love mister, without a sigh?
Salman Rushdie
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Even when things are at their worst, there's a little voice in your head saying, 'Good story!'
Salman Rushdie
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My parents gave me the gift of irreligion, of growing up without bothering to ask people what gods they held dear, assuming that in fact, like my parents, they weren't interested in gods, and that this uninterest was 'normal.' You may argue that the gift was a poisoned chalice, but even if so, that's a cup from which I'd happily drink again.
Salman Rushdie
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I think, in a written novel, the way in which you play with the readers' emotion or the way in which you engage the readers' emotions can be very indirect. You could come at it through irony or comedy, etcetera, and you could capture people's sympathies and feelings kind of by stealth if you like.
Salman Rushdie
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The Republicans were not always insane. They might've had politics I didn't agree with, but they weren't always actually certifiable.
Salman Rushdie
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I grew up in a family in which there was very little religion. My father wasn't religious at all. But he was really interested in the subject of, you know, the birth and growth of Islam. And he basically transmitted that interest to me.
Salman Rushdie
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Sometimes great, banned works defy the censor's description and impose themselves on the world - 'Ulysses,' 'Lolita,' the 'Arabian Nights.'
Salman Rushdie
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Have you noticed the physical resemblance between Imran Khan and Gaddafi? If you were making a movie of the life of Gaddafi and you wanted a slightly better-looking version of Gaddafi, you might cast Imran Khan.
Salman Rushdie
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Literature is where I go to explore the highest and lowest places in human society and in the human spirit, where I hope to find not absolute truth but the truth of the tale, of the imagination and of the heart.
Salman Rushdie
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People must be protected from prejudice against their person. But people cannot be protected from prejudice against their ideas - because otherwise we're all done.
Salman Rushdie
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I stand with Charlie Hebdo, as we all must, to defend the art of satire.
Salman Rushdie
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Not all possibilities are open to us. The world is finite our hopes spill over its rim.
Salman Rushdie
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Nobody wants to read a 600 page book in which the author is fabulous throughout.
Salman Rushdie
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A book is a version of the world. If you do not like it, ignore it or offer your own version in return.
Salman Rushdie
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My heart broke open and history fell in.
Salman Rushdie