Radio Times

Review by:

David Butcher

The day after Ayatollah Khomeini proclaimed the death sentence on his head, Salman Rushdie was due to attend a memorial service. Rushdie set off for the church but, as it turned out, didn’t return home for several years. Instead, in the press mêlée after the service, Alan Yentob came to his rescue with a lift in his car, and Rushdie’s years of hiding began.

Yentob and Rushdie chat in this moving, thoughtful film about the early days of the fatwa, how everyone thought it would take a few days for the government to sort it out, though in fact Rushdie spent the best part of a decade under police protection, a nightmare he has now relived in
a memoir published this week.

Readings from the book and sage contributions from the likes of Hanif Kureishi and Ian McEwan make for a haunting programme.

About this programme

One-off edition in which Salman Rushdie talks to Alan Yentob about being condemned to death by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1989 after writing The Satanic Verses, a book that prompted protests by Muslims for alleged blasphemy. To coincide with the publication of a memoir about that chapter of his life, the author speaks frankly about the nine years that followed, living in hiding with full police protection, scurrying between safe houses, being terrified for the life of his young son and hearing the news of his translators being attacked and killed.

Cast and crew

Cast

Presenter

Alan Yentob

Contributor

Salman Rushdie

Crew

Director

Jill Nichols

Producer

Jill Nichols

Series Editor

Alan Yentob

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