In response to the pandemic widely cancelling in person literary and arts festivals, this summer The Believer Festival, Portland Book Festival, Wisconsin Book Festival, and The Loft’s Worldplay have teamed up to put on virtual events. The first in the series was a conversation between Wordplay’s founding director Steph Opitz and Salman Rushdie. They discuss Rushdie’s latest Quichotte, a contemporary homage to Don Quixote, Pinocchio,works by Charles Dickens, and other familiar tales. In Quichotte, the Indian-American protagonist has been driven mad by reality TV, invented a son out of the cosmos, and is on a journey to win the heart of an opioid addicted Oprah-like celebrity. In this conversation, Rushdie talks process, opens up about how political movements impact his work, and asks how rage and art serve in a time of crisis.
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