Salman Rushdie Reads, Jokes for Square Audience

Joking that it was "definitely the first time I've ever read in a church," the Indian novelist Salman Rushdie read before several hundred people Monday night at the First Parish Church of Cambridge.

The reading was the final stop in a month-long book tour across the United States, and also kicked off the Harvard Square Book Festival, which runs May 10-16. The Boston Phoenix, a weekly listings newspaper, co-sponsored the reading.

Rushdie, whose 1989 novel The Satanic Verses provoked a worldwide controversy and a death sentence from Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomeini, read an excerpt from his latest book, The Ground Beneath Her Feet, published last month.

An author whose novels have consistently irked authority figures both religious and secular, Rushdie made no exception on Monday, selecting an excerpt that satirized corruption in the Indian government.

Rushdie described his book as "a rock-and-roll novel" recounting the lives of two Indian musicians whose band reaches international superstardom, as told through the eyes of their confidante Rai Merchant.

But the excerpt Rushdie chose on Monday diverged from that theme, focusing on the beginning of Rai's career as a photographer and the exposure of a nationwide scam.

It also developed the theme of the urban-rural divide in contemporary India, and indulged Rushdie's preference for the magical realist genre.

In an allusive moment, Rushdie closed the reading with a passage that reprised Molly Bloom's monologue at the end of James Joyce's "Ulysses."

"I just pinched it," Rushdie said. "Joyce pinched lots of things, by the way, so I think it's legit."

Rushdie has lived in hiding since 1989, when the Iranian government's death sentence forced him to go underground.

Last September, Iran announced publicly that while it could not revoke the death sentence, it would make no efforts to have it executed. A private foundation in Iran still maintains a $2.5 million price on Rushdie's head.

Rushdie is the author of seven novels, including Midnight's Children, which won the 1981 Booker Prize, England's most prestigious literary award and is widely considered his finest work. It was also named the "Booker of Bookers"--the best single book in the prize's 25-year history.

Rushdie's affable personality and rapier wit had the audience breaking up with laughter throughout the evening.

One audience member asked Rushdie whether he had reconsidered judgements he made as co-editor of an anthology of Indian fiction in light of critical response.

"You're asking if I changed my mind because people disagreed with me?" Rushdie said. "You may have heard that a lot of people disagreed with me once before."

"His arrogance, attitude and charm were all mixed in with his sense of humor," Caroline Stanculescu '00 said. "It was very refreshing."

Asked about a British tabloid photo which depicted him at the Playboy Mansion in Hollywood, Rushdie answered that "Clearly, that's where I've been for the last 10 years."

In what has become a necessary precaution at Rushdie's public appearances, audience members were frisked and their bags were checked at the door to the church, then passed through metal detectors once inside. Cambridge Police Department officers were also on hand.

"I expected more security, people with earpieces," Stanculescu said. "And it was really rather low-key. It was nothing more than going to a regular concert."