Patience Y Fortress are the names of the two lions of marble that preside over the entrance of the headquarters in Bryant Park of the New York Public Libraryan institution that pays homage every year to figures of letters and the arts for their achievements, giving them the honorary title of, precisely, lions. Salman Rushdie received this recognition in 2008. And this Friday, his words and his message in favor of freedom of expressionunwavering and like those marble lions also patient and strong, they have roared like a defiance of intolerance from the heart of Manhattan.
With the author of ‘the satanic verses‘ Recovering in a Pennsylvania hospital from the serious injuries he suffered on the 12th in the assassination attempt committed by a young American of Lebanese roots radicalized in his religious beliefs, others writersMany personal friends of Rushdie, have been in charge of talk about him and, above all, for him, through his writings. And under a scorching sun, in an open-air event organized by the Library and the PEN organization, there has been a cry not only in support of the writer, who was reportedly following the broadcast on the internet, but also “in defense of the freedom to write”.
Horrors of the past present
“When a would-be assassin plunged his knife into Salman Rushdie’s neck, it broke more than the flesh of a well-known writer, it struck through time, jolting us all to recognize what horrors of the past were eerily present”, Suzanne Nossel, CEO of PEN America, said to open the event. “But Not even steel could steal Salman Rushdie’s voice. not for a minute & rdquor ;.
Nossel has spoken of the 33 years of the “vendetta & rdquor; that have elapsed since Ayatollah Khomeini issued his deadly fatwa, a “declaration of an endless war against words”. And he has vowed to celebrate Rushdie “for what he has endured, but more importantly, what he has spawned: the stories, the characters, the metaphors and the images he has given to the world. Perhaps, above all & rdquor ;, he added, “let’s celebrate his pcreative assertiveness, perseverance in the face of danger, his perseverance in the name of ideals and principles that we must recognize & rdquor ;.
Then began the parade of authors and the reading of texts that put into Rushdie’s words those signs of perseverance. They have passed by the white staircase, among others, Gay Talese, Jeffrey Eugenides, Roya Hakakian, the painter Francisco Clemente, Andrew Solomon, Amanda Foreman and Andrea Elliot.
some have read literary texts, book passages, essays or short stories. From the voice of Hari Kuzrufor example, has reached the beginning of ‘the satanic verses‘, but not before the author recalled that “someone wrote that the writer’s role is to name the unspeakable, point to frauds, take sides, start discussions, shape the world and prevent it from falling asleep & rdquor; and ensure that this was the reason for the act: “We owe it (Rushdie) to stay awake”.
Also colum mccann has made his own introduction before reading ‘Out of Kansas’, a text by Rushdie for ‘The New Yorker’, and with echoes of the solidarity that was experienced after the attack against ‘Charlie Hebdo’ has proclaimed:Nous sommes Salman” (We are Salman).
Censorship
Others, on the other hand, have chosen speeches by Rushdie. It’s what he did AM Homeswhich revived an extract from a conference that the author pronounced in 2012. “Great art, or more modestly, original art, is never created in the safe middle ground, but always on the margins. Originality is dangerous. Challenge questions, flip assumptions, disturbs moral codes, disrespect sacred cows or similar entities. It can be scandalous or ugly or controversial. If we believe in freedom, if we want the air we breathe to continue to be abundant, this is the art whose right to exist we must not only defend but celebrate. Art is not entertainment, at its best it is a revolution & rdquor ;.
Also Tina Brown has chosen another speech, in his case one that Rushdie gave in 1996 before the Press Publishers Association of the United States, in which he said that “in a vision of a free society, the value of freedom of expression must come first. It is the freedom without which all other freedoms will fail. The exercise of freedom is the best defense of freedom.”
The words of that speech, as Brown recalled, sound “even more true” today. And it doesn’t seem like 26 years have passed since Rushdie said “we live in a It was more and more censorship. International acceptance of First Amendment values is steadily eroding. Many special interest groups, claiming the highest morals, ask for the censor’s protection. Political correctness and the rise of the religious right give the pro-censor lobi more entourage & rdquor ;.
In that speech Rushdie also assured that “in free societies there must be the free play of ideas”, he said that these societies”are dynamic, noisy, turbulent and full of radical disagreements”. “A free society is not a quiet place& rdquor ;, he remembered. “That’s the kind of dead static society that dictators are trying to create.”
ultra wave in usa
Paul Auster and Siri Hudsvert have read excerpts from Rushdie’s memoir ‘Joseph Anton’. The author has done so after pointing out that she read “in honor of a dream of truly democratic perspective of pluralismpluralism that recognizes not only the complex and impure realities of history, but also the hybrid history of each person becoming her, him or themselves, as well as their free speech rights in fiction and non-fiction with stark sincerity or savage irony. Without this freedom & rdquor ;, she has said, “literature is nothing more than an echo chamber of the ephemeral common places and platitude truths that affect all cultures & rdquor ;.
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Hudsvert also spoke to journalists afterwards and underlined the importance of the moment in which the assassination attempt took place, just when the conservative religious right in the US is promoting the ban on books in school libraries. “We must be on guard against this type of rampant intolerance& rdquor ;, he declared. “It’s happening everywhere, like the contempt for democracy. We need a plurality of voices, not the uniform voice of the theocracy & rdquor ;, added Hudsvert, who has asked “to be very clear about the most serious enemy in the US: it is theto the extreme right, which now includes all Republican Party”.
At the end of the act all the authors and present have posed for a group photo. They have shouted ‘We support Salman’. And they have closed an appointment whose importance had been summarized by the black poet Reginald Dwayne Betts, the first of the authors who had spoken. “Salman’s words matter.”