If you need further proof, seek out the Joseph Campbell PBS interview from last year. When Campbell asks him what he made of the controversial Danish cartoons satirizing Mohammed, Rushdie replies, without losing a beat, “Do you think God cares about a cartoon in a Danish newspaper?” Indeed.

We desis are very, very lucky to have such a brilliant, funny, deeply human writer to speak for us. My only wish is that his writing turns to India once again, because his knowledge and love for the country are so deep.

I’m sure Michiko Kakutani doesn’t know enough to gauge it or appreciate it. Red sandstone looking like red smoke at dawn and all– how woudld anyone know what Rushdie has done if they haven’t seen it for themselves and don’t know from Jodha Bai? I was so relieved to see a British review of The Darjeeling Limited that remarked on how they seemed to be passing through Rajasthan that the difference in Rushdie reviews here and in Blighty makes me quite nostalgic for the familiarity of over the pond. But that will come — here, I mean.

Sorry, I meant as bawdy as the Bard of Avon.

Anokha, he’s always been just a s bawdy as the bard of Avon. Sign of greatness.

Amardeep, he’s gotta know who you are.

Kakutani must have been in a hurry when reading Rushdie’s latest. Only an impatient, boring reader could call it confusing – as she has done.

And as Ben Yagoda stated in Slate about NYT’s Kakutani: One has the sense of her deciding roughly at Page 2 whether or not a book is worthy; reading the rest of it to gather evidence for her case; spending some quality time with the Thesaurus; and then taking a large blunt hammer and pounding the message home.

Yes. More similarities: Both Zakaria Sr. and Rushdie Sr. studied in England and practiced law.

On Sunday, he had a snippet of an iv with FAreed Z. Again he was eloquently emphatic about his hatred of fundamentalism. I couldn’t help but think – these 2 Bombay boys (are they from the same religious background?), i wish the other one had a talk show.

Google got off to a bad start with the publishing industry when in began digitizing entire works without asking. The publishing industry is, in turn, totally technophobic, so the “snippets” thing is hard for most to understand. Even as they use it, they fear marauding Mongol armies of hackers, stealing and downloading away. Another fear about digitizing it that it makes piracy cheaper and easier. None of this is really valid or even makes sense, but most authors seem to have that alarmist attitude.

Have to say that digitizing is wrecking reference publishing. Most companies are scrambling to get online and cutting on print publications, but it’s a slow process and the info is already available for free in most cases. Dictionaries, encyclopedias, specialized reference of all kinds…and of course, newspapers and magazines.

the reading was being teleconferenced live with three other Google offices, which you could see on a screen projected behind Rushdie’s head. (By contrast, when we have readings where I teach, we have enough trouble just getting the microphones to work without brutal feedback…)

Was at a book conference and attended a seminar to see Google pitch the books project…nothing worked. Trouble with the slideshow, the video presentation wouldn’t even start. Speakers had relied on the electronic material so scrambled to speak extemporaneously and when the laptop finally projected onto the plain white dropcloth, went to websites to get the info they needed. Google has its awkward days too

(Otherwise, he stated, rather direly, “it could destroy the publishing industry.”) In my experience using Books.Google.com, the “snippets” view seems to work quite well to limit access to in-copyright texts, so perhaps Rushdie was being overly alarmist here.

I agree. Destroy the publishing industry? Truely doubtful, even if more books were online. I don’t know one person who could tolerate reading a book online. I suppose it could be argued that more people will be able to get a taste of what the book is about, and decide not to buy it. But then wouldn’t the vice versa also be true. And doesn’t this come into play when we skim that book for 15 minutes in the bookstore. Anyway. Interesting post.

I wouldn’t say his fear is completely baseless. Many times during writing papers, I have searched for specific texts which google showed in the book snippets. I of course gleefully used the information; but it made me wonder if the library would care to buy the actual book in its reserve if people like me (who sometimes care about specific info and not the whole book) continue to get their info from google books.