I Became A Writer Because

The Liveliness Of Literature Lies In Its Exceptionality, In Being The Individual, Idiosyncratic Vision Of One Human Being, In Which, To Our Delight And Great Surprise, We May Find Our Own Vision Reflected.

When You Are Writing A Book, It Feels As If You Are Simply Concentrating On The World Of The Book And That Whatever Is Happening In Your Personal Life Is Outside The Room, As It Were. But Maybe That's Just The Way You Have To Talk To Yourself To Make It Possible.

One Of The Problems With Defending Free Speech Is You Often Have To Defend People That You Find To Be Outrageous And Unpleasant And Disgusting.

The Response Of Anybody Interested In Liberty Is That We All Have A Say And The Ability To Have An Argument Is Exactly What Liberty Is, Even Though It May Never Be Resolved. In Any Authoritarian Society The Possessor Of Power Dictates, And If You Try And Step Outside He Will Come After You.

In Writing 'the Satanic Verses,' I Think I Was Writing For The First Time From The Whole Of Myself. The English Part, The Indian Part. The Part Of Me That Loves London, And The Part That Longs For Bombay. And At My Typewriter, Alone, I Could Indulge This.