Salman Rushdie is awarded knighthood!

[SeattleUte]

Giving literary awards for largely political reasons is common practice now. The most egregious offender is the Nobel committee. No one of Anglo-Saxon heritage will win the Nobel prize in our lifetimes unless he is openly and fiercely anti-American (this describes an Irish playwright who won it a year or two back). It used to be that American Jews won it (Singer and Bellow), even a white American male famous for his manliness (Hemingway) once won it. Much has changed in the past couple of decades. This year's winner was a Westernized Turk who at personal risk criticized his government for genocide of Armenians. He was charged and tried for the crime of insulting Turkishness. See the second paragraph of the linked article.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15232786/

International recognition for literary merit is, distressingly, mostly politics. I agree with comments of others here that Rushdie owes a great deal of his literary fame to the fatwa. It's the best thing that ever happened to him. It made him a culteral hero. I'm surprised he hasn't won the Nobel, since though his writing is lacking he's a better writer than some who have won it recently.