Intellectual exiles come from democracies, too.

Salman Rushdie was our canary in the coal mine: He first felt the effects of suffocating gasses that would start to envelope us all.

Rushdie's fourth novel, The Satanic Verses, published in late 1988 when he was living in Britain, was seen as blasphemous by some Muslims. Feb. 14 will mark 20 years since Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini sent the author a bloody Valentine, issuing a religious decree calling for his death.

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