At the time of this interview, it had been more than six years since the Ayatollah Khomeini issued a death sentence against writer Salman Rushdie. Rushdie lived in hiding but continued to write and to make a few semi-public appearances. His book, Haroun and the Sea of Stories, published in 1990, was a fairy tale written for his son. His 1995 book East, West is a collection of stories about the line that divides East and West, migration, exile, and the notion of home.