Joseph Anton

A Memoir

De: Salman Rushdie

Narrado por: Sam Dastor, Salman Rushdie

On February 14, 1989, Valentine's Day, Salman Rushdie was telephoned by a BBC journalist and told that he had been "sentenced to death" by the Ayatollah Khomeini. For the first time he heard the word fatwa. His crime? To have written a novel called The Satanic Verses, which was accused of being "against Islam, the Prophet and the Quran".

So begins the extraordinary story of how a writer was forced underground, moving from house to house, with the constant presence of an armed police protection team. He was asked to choose an alias that the police could call him by. He thought of writers he loved and combinations of their names; then it came to him: Conrad and Chekhov - Joseph Anton.

How do a writer and his family live with the threat of murder for more than nine years? How does he go on working? How does he fall in and out of love? How does despair shape his thoughts and actions, how and why does he stumble, how does he learn to fight back? In this remarkable memoir Rushdie tells that story for the first time; the story of one of the crucial battles, in our time, for freedom of speech. He talks about the sometimes grim, sometimes comic realities of living with armed policemen, and of the close bonds he formed with his protectors; of his struggle for support and understanding from governments, intelligence chiefs, publishers, journalists, and fellow writers; and of how he regained his freedom.

It is a book of exceptional frankness and honesty, compelling, provocative, moving, and of vital importance. Because what happened to Salman Rushdie was the first act of a drama that is still unfolding somewhere in the world every day.

This audiobook includes a prologue read by the author.

©2012 Salmon Rushdie (P)2012 Random House Audio

Reseñas de la Crítica

"In Salman Rushdie... India has produced a glittering novelist -one with startling imaginative and intellectual resources, a master of perpetual storytelling." ( The New Yorker)

"Salman Rushdie has earned the right to be called one of our great storytellers." ( The Observer)

"Our most exhilaratingly inventive prose stylist, a writer of breathtaking originality." ( Financial Times)

Gripping and Fantasical

Santanic Versea likely will be remembered as the most controversial book of the later half of 20th century for the shear amount of political controversy it illicited globally, worthy or not. But what happens when you write one of the the most controversial books of the century?

Joseph Anton has the answer. Salmon Rushdie, in 3rd person, meanders through his entire life. Taking moments to ponder, life, love, religion and family from pre-fatwa to post. His journey takes him from his life as Salmon and his alias, Joseph, used under police protection.

The story is one of preserveance, despite some of his own short comings... A story that has him bumping shoulders (or more accurately rubbed) by Margaret Thacter, chats with Bill Clinton, dinners with Tony Blair, friendships with Christopher Hitchens, and even Bono. Despite what might have been mistook as glamour and ego was a caged man, who was barely able to leave his own house and difficulties performing basic father tasks with his son.

While Salmon, drops names frequently, to the point of blurring into the ether, what remains is story with personal victory with plenty off tragedy. Only knowing Salmon from appearances in the media, I finally was motivated to read one of his works and settled for the one that interested me the most. Having been narrowly old enough to claim to lived through the entire 80s, many of the books earlier events served as a portrait of the confusion of multiculturalism and a global society in a time I lived through but was not old enough to have meaningful comprehension. The extent of Iran's treachery even given today's misgivings is shocking, the British lack of desire to defend its own citizens is surprising and the global Islamophobia pandemic is current.

Salmon is a harsh judge of himself but also holds himself with regard, likely the same dignity that kept him sane. I enjoyed this book immensely, as Rushdie is passionate, insightful, and charasmatic.

Important book!

Ok, will you "like" this book? Not necessarily but you will be glad you read it. It explores the years and years of Salmon Rushdie's life while he was in hiding from the fatwa. It goes on and on, and he does not hide the truth: he is not a martyr or a perfect man, he is just a writer who crossed he Wrong people. Do you believe in religious fanaticism? Do you know the prequel to 9-11 ? Please take the time to listen to this and think about these very life and death matters.

Loved the humor

Slow start but it grew on me. My favorite parts were the ironical ones. Highly recommend.

Captivating Memoir

Joseph Anton is Rushdie's memoir of the years he spent, mostly in hiding, under the Ayatollah Khomeini's fatwa. The fatwa, which was announced on Valentine's Day, 1989, has never been officially revoked; in 1998, the Iranian government proclaimed that it would neither support nor hinder attempts to assassinate the author, but there is still a $3 million-plus bounty on his head. The title of the book is the name Rushdie assumed while in Scotland Yard's protection and is taken from two of his favorite writers: "Joseph" from Conrad and "Anton" from Chekhov. In a recent interview, Rushdie claimed that during this time he felt as if he was watching another person's life from a distance, a person separate from himself--hence the book is written in third person.

It's hard to imagine what life would be like if you were forced to move at a moment's notice--dozens of times. To live with a squad of armed policemen (one of whom accidentally blew a hole through a wall). To be unable to visit a dying parent, have dinner with friends, attend a memorial or an activity at your child's school, or, as a writer, give public readings of your work. Rushdie details all of this, as well as his efforts to live as normal a life as possible. For this, he credits a cadre of trusted friends, including Christopher Hitchens, Paul Auster, Bill Buford, Martin Amis, Ian McEwan, and Bono, among others. Rushdie also engaged in a constant legal battle to get The Satanic Verses distributed worldwide in paperback format.

Of course, Rushdie's personal life suffered during this time. His greatest regret is the difficulty the fatwa caused for his son Zafar, who was 10 at the time it all began. Although divorced from his first wife, Clarissa Luard, the two remained friendly and strove to maintain as normal a relationship as possible for father and son. Marianne Wiggins, his second wife, to whom he was married when the fatwa was pronounced, does not come off so well; in fact, the American writer is depicted as a selfish, self-promoting wacko. Rushdie met his third wife, Elizabeth West, the mother of his second son, while under protection. Initially, West seems almost saint-like in her patience and devotion, but this image falls apart as the marriage falters due to her depression over not bearing more children and Rushdie's desire to move to the US, where he felt he could live a more open, normal life. Wife Number Four, model, would-be actress, and reality show host Padma Lakshmi,is referred to as "The Illusion," and Rushdie rather shamefacedly admits to falling into a fairly typical mid-life crisis (homely older man, beautiful younger woman), as well as pursuing a somewhat elusive American dream that she came to represent. Lakshmi, like Wiggins, comes off as self-absorbed and ambitious (when he attempts to visit her in LA after a new threat has been announced, she says she is going on a lingerie shoot), and Rushdie makes short shrift of her.

On the whole, Rushdie's memoir is insightful and engaging. If one thing is made clear, it is that he wouldn't have endured, had it not been for the love, help, and encouragement of his close friends, family, and associates. And it is this humanization of Salman Rushdie, more than his literary achievements or politicized position, that allows readers to relate to his plight.

The reader, Sam Dastoor, was brilliant, with one caveat: his American accent, which never varied. Whether he was impersonating Bill Clinton, Kurt Vonnegut, George Stephanopoulos, or Susan Sontag, they all sounded like sarcastic cowboys.

A revealing memoir by a great writer

Any additional comments?

My only annoyance with the otherwise superb narrator was his tendency, when creating a variety of national accents, to make all Americans sound like idiots. Naturally, with a book this long, it was a pleasure to sit passively or attend to the third-person narrative while walking. Yes, it's a third-person narrative: Rushdie refers to himself as 'he" -- meaning, of course, his adopted persona whilst hiding from the fatwa assassins as Joseph Anton.

Rushdie rarely flatters himself and frequently reveals his weaknesses. As far as food for thought is concerned, the whole memoir seems like a metaphor for a world stripped of logic and common sense. It's a theater of the absurd, potentially and often actually tragic. Men and women act on unreasoned fears, they are victimized by their prejudices and ignorance, and almost nobody knows what's going on or what they are talking about.

The book also chills the spine with its enormous specter of religious fanaticism.

And for those who believe the victim is too often blamed for the crime, this is wonderful fuel for your argument.

I couldn't stop listening

I love Salman Rushdie's fiction and this memoir matches up with the best of it. It is very artfully crafted and the level of prose blows other memoirs out of the water. I read a fair number of biographies and auto-biographies; the sections on the subject's childhood is usually intolerable--full of incidents the author thinks are symbolic and often made worse by pop-psychoanalysis. Rushdie's childhood story is at the other end of the spectrum. He uses it to talk about religion and literature and all sorts of cool things you wouldn't expect to come up in a section of boyhood stories.

The narrator is very good, but Rushdie read the introduction and I do wish he had read the entire book.

Great book, but the accents were painful

Overall I loved the book, but the narrator’s accents were really awful and twangy.
Maybe just don’t do them in future recordings.

Really surprised I enjoyed it this much.

I would rate this in the top 10 out of the 75 books I have listened to. The narrator was excellent - switching into different voices that were very entertaining. Rushdie's writing was very smooth and enjoyable. Satanic Verses is next on my list to listen to.

Way to go Joe... :)

Great

The story is phenomenal. Very few autobiographies are so great. Took two days to finish the book.

This is a very good solid work and reading.

What did you love best about Joseph Anton?

This is the story of one man's fight to stay alive. He did nothing but tell stories and found himself in the middle of a storm that no person should have to face in an age well past the "Age of Enlightenment."

What was one of the most memorable moments of Joseph Anton?

Most memorable in this work was the history of Salman's struggle with the consequences of writing a novel. The evil forces in the world and how organized religion has no place in the world of free speech was in this work, put on a plate for examination.

Which scene was your favorite?

The entire book is a history of the attack on free speech in the 20th and 21st century.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

The man and those around him faced true hardship but carried and how Salman was so very honest about his behavior in the face of unbelievable attacks.

Any additional comments?

This a great followup to questions which remain and persist on where we stand as free loving western people against the forces of darkness.