This book utterly transcends the nonsense of it being somehow offensive to a religion. It rises to attack racism, notions of good and evil, religious power among others. Like other Rushdie works, it’s pages are filled with poetry and power. I will read it again.

One of the great books of the 20th century.

If not for the PC police in the west and the islamic world’s occaisional homicidal nuts, this book would be taught in every literature class for the questions it raises.

Despite all the hoopla due to the fatwa, this is really a thoughtful book and dense with literary symbolism, allusions, and themes. From the first assertion regarding the height of Mt. Everest, all truth (including the truth in this novel) is called into question. It is timely in examining the products of fanatical belief and modern skepticism.

Belief and skepticism, reality and illusion, good and evil are all contrasted. And in the contrasting Rushdie muddies the waters to show that good and evil aren’t as obvious to the beholder as our religions might have us believe.

read a biography of the prophet M. before reading this to get a sense of what the ‘fuss’ was about!

This book could stand on its own, & might have caused a sensation in the literary world even if Rushdie hadn’t traversed so many taboos.