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The time-honored role of the artist [is] to speak truth to power.
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
Time
Honored
Role
Roles
Speak
Artist
Truth
Power
More quotes by Salman Rushdie
Human beings, you see, do absolutely two primary things. We see like and unlike. Like becomes, in literature, simile and metaphor. Unlike becomes uniqueness and difference, from which I believe, the novel is born.
Salman Rushdie
With death comes honesty.
Salman Rushdie
You start at the stupid end of the book, and if you're lucky you finish at the smart end.
Salman Rushdie
At the height of the British Empire very few English novels were written that dealt with British power. It's extraordinary that at the moment in which England was the global superpower the subject of British power appeared not to interest most writers.
Salman Rushdie
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
But love is what we want, not freedom. Who then is the unluckier man? The beloved, who is given his heart's desire and must for ever after fear its loss, or the free man, with his unlooked-for liberty, naked and alone between the captive armies of the earth?
Salman Rushdie
Out-of-step intellectuals like Noam Chomsky and the deceased Edward Said have often been dismissed as crazy extremists, 'anti-American,' and in Mr. Said's case even, absurdly, as apologists for Palestinian 'terrorism.'
Salman Rushdie
Even when things are at their worst, there's a little voice in your head saying, 'Good story!'
Salman Rushdie
I write books I'd enjoy reading, I'm the reader standing behind my shoulder.
Salman Rushdie
Don't you know girls have to fool people every day of their lives if they want to get anywhere?
Salman Rushdie
Sometimes I think that when people become famous, there's a public perception that they are not human beings any more. They don't have feelings they don't get hurt you can act and say as you like about them.
Salman Rushdie
There is no magic on earth strong enough to wipe out the legacies of one's parents.
Salman Rushdie
And using that - the birth of a religion, it suggests that you have got two tests. You have the test of weakness. When you're weak, do you compromise, do you bend, do you give in, do you accommodate? And then the test of strength. When you're strong, are you merciful, are you generous, or are you cruel?
Salman Rushdie
I hate admitting that my enemies have a point.
Salman Rushdie
If you were standing next to the prophet on the mountain, would you have seen the archangel? And my answer to that was probably not, even though it's supposed to be a really big archangel. He describes it as - the Archangel Gabriel as standing on the horizon and filling the sky. That's a big angel.
Salman Rushdie
Writers have an opinion about the world and offer arguments about the world. They should offer contemplation.
Salman Rushdie
I think it's a very important function of art to challenge accepted reality, especially when that reality is created by powerful interest groups.
Salman Rushdie
A mature society understands that at the heart of democracy is argument.
Salman Rushdie
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
What kind of Christmas present would Jesus ask Santa for?
Salman Rushdie
