Satanic Verses- background

Hi guys, although I know you can all use wikipedia I thought it might be fun to post some links to background info on this book... especially since there has been so much discussion of it for so many different (political/cultural/religious/philosophical) reasons. SO.... here are some alternatives to wikipedia:

I'm not so sure what the deal is with the host site for this article (and i haven't had time to do a more critical reading of their other materials...) but this seems to be a good and BRIEF summary of what the real Satanic Verses are, and why they are controversial:

http://www.answering-islam.org/Hahn/satanicverses.htm

The New York Times site for Salman Rushdie, including reveiws of his books and links to articles on the Fatwa situation:

http://www.nytimes.com/books/99/04/18/specials/rushdie.html

Study Guides can be really dangerous in that they can often really change the way you read a book... but given that there is so much going on in this book that we might not pick up on this might be interesting to look at once you're finished with your own reading... i've only glanced at the contents, but I googled the prof. and he looks legit. (its a pdf)

http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/anglophone/satanic_verses/svnotes.pdf

Courtesy of YouTube... Salman Rushdie reads from the Satanic Verses.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=v20VvP19kCI