Salman Rushdie used a rare public speech on Monday night to speak up for freedom of expression amid rising calls for book bans in America. Speaking in a video message delivered to the British Book Awards in London nine months after he was stabbed and blinded in one eye during an event in New York, Rushdie said: “We live in a moment, I think, at which freedom of expression, freedom to publish has not in my lifetime been under such threat in the countries of the West.” The British-American novelist, 75, added: “Now I am sitting here in the U.S., I have to look at the extraordinary attack on libraries, and books for children in schools. The attack on the idea of libraries themselves. It is quite remarkably alarming, and we need to be very aware of it, and to fight against it very hard.” The Satanic Verses novelist went on to criticize editing old books like those by Roald Dahl and James Bond writer Ian Fleming to suit modern tastes, saying books should be permitted to “come to us from their time and be of their time.” “And if that’s difficult to take, don’t read it, read another book,” Rushdie said.
