.... what is it about my book that has elicited such a response from people whose work it is to trade in ideas?
Have I penned an incendiary tome that “insults” Islam or otherwise risks “offending” Muslims? Well, I don’t think I’ve done any such thing — I’ve simply written an account of how and why I came to be an atheist. It’s much less an attack on religion than it is a celebration of atheism.
But the fact that it is written by someone from a Muslim background seems to have been sufficient to make some people afraid of publishing it.
And that is surely an unacceptable state of affairs; we seem to have gone from a time when publishers and booksellers stood shoulder to shoulder in defence of free speech to publish and sell The Satanic Verses, despite the very real threat of violence, to a time when an entirely innocuous book like mine can be rejected for publication because people fear it will lead to violent repercussions. [Index] Read more
