Should Salman Rushdie Live and Let Die ?
You oppose art being banned. But would a movie that calls for you to be killed change your view of censorship? Iain Robert Smith opens the BBFC archives on the Rushdie affair.
You are a liberal who opposes art being banned. But would a movie that calls for you to be killed change your view of censorship? This was the quandary facing Salman Rushdie when filmmakers in Pakistan produced a James Bond-style action thriller in which a trio of Islamist guerrillas are inspired by Ayatollah Khomeini’s fatwa to track down and kill the author of The Satanic Verses. In the year of the 30th anniversary of the fatwa against the novelist from Iranian clerics, film historian Dr Iain Robert Smith explores what this largely-forgotten episode from the Rushdie affair can tell us about current debates on freedom of expression.
Iain Robert Smith researches the impact of globalisation on popular films made around the world. He teaches at King’s College, London.
The Essay was recorded at the Free Thinking Festival at Sage Gateshead.
New Generation Thinkers is a scheme run by ±«Óãtv Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to select 10 academics each year who can turn their research into radio.
Producer: Fiona McLean
Last on
Broadcast
- Wed 10 Apr 2019 22:45±«Óãtv Radio 3
Featured in...
![]()
Free Thinking Festival 2019—Free Thinking
Angry politics, what we can’t say, being diplomatic, weeping, emotion in music, film & TV
![]()
Arts
Creativity, performance, debate
Death in Trieste
A 1760s murder still informs ideas about aesthetics, a certain sort of sex, and death.
Watch: My Deaf World
Five compelling experiences of what it is like to be deaf in 21st-century Britain.
The Book that Changed Me
Five figures from the arts and science introduce books that changed their lives and work.
Download The Essay
Download all the episodes from the series and listen at your leisure.
Podcast
-
![]()
The Essay
Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.
