Sir Salman Rushdie Furious at Bodyguard's Tell All Memoir
So when did Sir Salman Rushdie cross the line into tabloid fixture rather than literary figure? When the fatwa calling for his death was issued? When he married, then got a divorce from Padma Lakshmi? When he was knighted? When his romantic exploits were avidly chronicled? Well, Sir Salman has just endured another celebrity rite of passage: a former bodyguard is writing a tell-all book about him. And Sir Salman isn't happy about it.
Sir Salman Rushdie is threatening to sue a former police bodyguard who has written a book about protecting the author while he was in hiding.
The award-winning writer is furious at the way he has been portrayed by Ron Evans in On Her Majesty's Service.
Mr Evans was among the officers who guarded Sir Salman after The Satanic Verses led to death threats in 1989.
The author told BBC News the claims were "a bunch of lies" and he was seriously considering legal action.
Sir Salman said the book was defamatory and is demanding that the offending chapters be removed.
The Booker Prize-winning author received police protection after a fatwa was issued by Ayatollah Khomeini, Iran's spiritual leader.
Mr Evans worked as a driver in the protection unit. He was also a bodyguard for John Major and other high-profile figures.
I was never locked in a cupboard nor was I suicidal - none of these things happened, said Sir Salman Rushdie
In the book, he claims Sir Salman was nicknamed "Scruffy" and was once locked in a cupboard because he irritated his protection officers. They then all went to the pub.
He wrote: "When they were suitably refreshed they came back and let him out."
He also claims the author charged officers around £
40 a night to stay in his home and would also ask for money if they drank his wine.
In the memoirs, Mr Evans writes: "We were paying, or rather, the taxpayer was paying Rushdie to protect him!"
Sir Salman replied: "He's made up a whole bunch of lies.
I became extremely friendly and fond of the police officers who protected me.
They were extremely scrupulous and would never behave so cruelly to me, get drunk on duty or do anything else he has said.
At the end of my nine years of protection, they even held a party for me.
He has not checked his facts. I was never locked in a cupboard nor was I suicidal. None of these things happened."
The bodyguards called him Scruffy and locked him in a closet? How incredibly odd. We need more details. Surely this can't be all the dirt he has to dish?
