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A. Certainly. There were very long periods of time when I thought I would never write again. What was the point of it anyway? I'd simply written a novel -- a 500-page, complicated, literary novel that insulted even people who hadn't read it. You expect a debate, or a dispute, or an argument -- that seems to me an entirely legitimate function of art. What you don't expect is an attempt to intimidate the book's publishers and murder the book's author.
Q. Last year you embraced Islam. Why?
A. I believe there needs to be a secular way of being a Muslim. There are plenty of people in the Muslim world who feel exactly like that -- an identity with culture and values -- but who are not believers in the theology. That was what I was trying to say, or I would've said it if anybody had listened hard enough. But immediately I was called either a traitor to my own cause or a hypocrite.
Q. What if political pressure does not work? Are you living with a life sentence?
A. I don't want even to contemplate what you suggest because I don't believe the situation is as bleak as that. But the fact is I'm not going to accept it forever.
Q. You've said free speech is life itself. Has it been worth fighting for?
A. Yes, it has. Yes, it has. Clearly, nobody wants such an incredible distortion of one's daily life; in fact, nothing else will happen in my life of remotely this magnitude.
But at least it's the right plight. At least it's about what I believe most deeply in. And therefore it's possible to fight for it. At least the fight is about the right thing.