11-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Knife by Salman Rushdie audiobook review – 27 seconds that changed everything
On 12 August 2022, Salman Rushdie was at a literary conference in Chautauqua, New York, about to deliver a lecture on keeping writers from harm, when a stranger rushed at him with a knife. Rushdie – who in 1989 had a fatwa issued against him by Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini calling for his death, after the publication of his novel The Satanic Verses – was stabbed in his neck, chest, hand and eye.
Knife is Rushdie's memoir of his 'near-death' in which he recalls seeing his attacker and thinking to himself: 'So it's you. Here you are.' The attack lasted 27 seconds and, to this day, the author remains bewildered that he didn't fight back. 'Was I so feeble that I couldn't make the slightest attempt to defend myself?' he asks. As baffling to him is that the man, a Lebanese-American whom he calls 'The A' (short for 'Assailant' or 'Ass'), had never read The Satanic Verses. Instead, he had watched clips of Rushdie lecturing on YouTube and concluded that he was 'disingenuous'.
A harrowing account of the before, during and after of a violent assault, Knife is given added power and immediacy in being narrated by Rushdie himself. His tone throughout moves between anger, resignation and dry humour. While he is unsparing with the details – for a while his eyeball, which could not be saved, lolled on his cheek like 'a large soft-boiled egg' – there are also outpourings of love for his friends, family and his wife, Rachel Eliza Griffiths. The ultimate intention in Knife is to reveal how love triumphs over cruelty and to 'answer violence with art'.
Available via Penguin Audio, 6hr 22min
Love in ExileShon Faye, Penguin Audio, 7hr 1min
An insightful memoir of one woman's search for love, the commodification of romance and finding one's self-worth. Read by the author.
Sign up to Inside Saturday
The only way to get a look behind the scenes of the Saturday magazine. Sign up to get the inside story from our top writers as well as all the must-read articles and columns, delivered to your inbox every weekend.
after newsletter promotion
Show Don't TellCurtis Sittenfeld, Penguin Audio, 10hr 32minA cast of narrators including Xe Sands, Michael Crouch and Kristen Sieh read this short-story collection from the Romantic Comedy author.
