Salman Rushdie admits to having faced racism

JAIPUR: Indian-born author Salman Rushdie has said racism is a reality and he himself faced racist behaviour in his early days in the UK.

He added, "Now, when I am in India, London or New York, I don't feel like a foreigner. There was a time I did feel one, in all these places."

The Booker Prize winning author is here to attend the second Jaipur Literature Festival.

While talking to newspersons, the internationally renowned author who kicked up a storm in the Muslim world with his Satanic Verses, said Muslims must think over the means they have chosen to achieve their target, in an apparent referrence to the turmoil in the Islamic world.

The critically acclaimed author said people are identified with religion, region, nationality which creates a 'baggage of identity' and is commonplace.

"Once we are able to define our identities irrespective of these factors, we would be able to reach a common ground," he explained. He said terrorism is a great threat but it must be fought without guns.

Rushdie considers his first novel Midnights Children that won him a Booker Prize and catapulted him to literary fame, his best work ever.

The renowned author said, "The work which gave me the most creative satisfaction was Midnights children."

He said, "It was the most pleasurble thing and writing the book was really fun. It has been appreciated by the classes and masses."

But he regretted that he has not written many short stories. "I have written only a dozen short stories and plan to write more in future," he said.

When asked whether the brand India excites him, the author said though he did not believe in brands, he was very conscious of his Indian roots. "I could not manage to write a book without a central Indian character in my book.''  

Admitting that he has not read any work by an Indian author, Rushdie said according to him Ranadas Gupta was among the best Indian-origin writers in English.

The acclaimed writer said his next work is a historical novel set in the 16th century India and Italy. He said, "I feel very nervous about talking about unfinished works. I am writing a historical novel set in the 16th century India and Italy and a comparative study of the thought process of the book of 'Babarnama' and the works of Macaulay".