Rick Simonson

Rushdie Along: Noon Enchantment
June 16, 2008

Two weeks after being a central part of a lively Random House party at BEA in Los Angeles, Salman Rushdie re-materialized on the West Coast. His three public Seattle appearances for his newly published novel, The Enchantress of Florence, included one with Elliott Bay, in-store, at noon.

Were it not that the other major appearance was a large-hall offsite, that would certainly have been the way we would have gone, have gone when we've presented him in the sometime checkered history we've had. We were on tap for Seattle's Town Hall for his first, truly open post-Fatwa tour, for the novel Fury in 2001, when certain tragic events befell New York City, Washington, D.C., and Pennsyvania ... not the right time for a satirical novel featuring New York. Before 2001 ...

That history was alluded to, along with some wondering about the state of Seattle's economy: what were all these people doing away from work, noon-time or not? Hundreds were on hand, speaking of materialized. In introducing him for this first-ever reading he made in-store, I mentioned how close we'd come twenty years ago. He was making the rounds, albeit a limited circuit, for his first nonfiction book, The Jaguar's Smile, drawn from travels in Nicaragua. He got as close as Berkeley (I remember the Black Oak broadside), but time for Seattle wasn't there. He had to get back and wrap things up with this big novel. But when that big novel came out, then he would be around.

Except he wasn't. That was March 1989. That was The Satanic Verses. We were among the scheduled, and those were the days when off-sites weren't quite yet imagined. The whole circuitry of literary author tours was still fairly nascent.

Seven years on from then, early 1996, a Seattle visit was finally consummated. The good people of Pantheon were publishing The Moor's Last Sigh. It was evident, from early notice, that some sort of publicity was being plotted. In most cities, it would turn out,  it would be press interviews and invitations to clandestine, unannounced parties. In New York and Washington, D.C., there had been highly secret readings attended by select, fairly limited (in size, too) audiences - PEN, or some writers group, was involved with the New York reading, I believe.

In Seattle, we had chirpily offered to help stage something. To everyone's astonishment, Pantheon took us up on it - once we got past the are you serious? stage. 

We partnered with Seattle Arts & Lectures, which had a finite but good-sized subscriber list. Together we quietly rented a large hall. A letter of invitation unlike any I've ever been party to was drawn up - the first time people were invited to something knowing Salman Rushdie would be there - but the conditions of utmost secrecy, of non-transferability, of ID-checks, and arriving early to allow for metal detector scanning, and a strict RSVP procedure - all were laid down as part of it.

Come the night, but a week after the invites were sent out (some who assumed the mailing was about rescheduling a postponed Tim O'Brien appearance, swore always to promptly open such mail forever after), over a thousand people filled an old church. Anticipation was more than palpable. Even Rushdie, I think, was a bit moved by this one - the first, and largest, reading he'd given to a general audience, an audience that knew he was there (and not sprung as a surprise guest, as had happened in some venues) in a long, long time.

I remember then - after the thunderous ovation - his beginning to talk and then read. The audience, at first, was almost deflated. After all of that, including all that Rushdie himself had gone through, here he simply was, a writer standing and reading at a podium. Just like any other. It felt as though one could hear this silently, collectively being worked out. Then, slowly, but in a way that built, you could also sense the audience start to engage, to hear, to laugh - for Rushdie is a superb reader and performer, absolutely the last writer whom enforced silence should have been thrust upon.

Jump ahead to noontime, June 12, 2008, the basement space of Elliott Bay, some hundreds on hand. A dazzling tale, set back and forth between Mughal India and Renaissance Florence, certain historical personages present and accounted for (emperor Akbar, the Medicis, Machiavelli), and a teeming array of imagined ones. The space's intimacy doesn't hurt - Rushdie doesn't have to play 'big.' He has everyone in the palm of his hand - people who work in the cafe, are peering around, trying to take it all in.

When it's questions, he handles that well, too. I don't know what happens elsewhere, but he has his curveballs in Seattle. At a few of the post-fatwa appearances, he had a woman propose marriage to him. At one of those appearances, he was recounting the prior exchange: 'Last time I was in Seattle, a woman proposed to me.' From the darkness of the hall the call went out: 'I'm still here!" Massive laughter. Rushdie: 'I rather thought you might be.'

The first questioner at this reading, a woman in the front row, led off with a lengthy question about Marianne Wiggins (a former wife), which segues to a review she did of The Satanic Verses which he was welcome to yet make use of (including removing the critical parts ... 'how generous of you'), saying also that she compared him, in the end, to Shakespeare ('well, that's modest praise indeed.') He handled it so adroitly.

It was evident, too, from hearing people before and after, while the signing went on, that this was a perfect kind of audience - all ages, a diverse group (Rushdie commented on how many Indians there were) - but even more, there was a mix of people who've read the books and champion this or that, and those who have heard of him (he's had a few reasons to be in the news, a 19-year-ago fatwa being among them, but not the only one) but never really taken on reading him. Now, here they were, enchanted by what they'd heard, and buoyed along by others' guiding enthusiasm.

It was hard, after all of this, to have it only be 2 in the afternoon. A full day's excitement had happened - and then some. More than anything, you wanted to go somewhere and read, not only with his work, but in talkng of others (Rushdie talking about going back to The Great Gatsby 35 years later probably sold a copy or two of that).

We knew he was heading south from Seattle - save for Vancouver, all points on the book circuit are south - and is likely still yet West ... wherever, we wish him good travels and continued stories, many yet to be told.

Posted by Rick Simonson on June 16, 2008 | Comments (1)