There are several reasons why today is looking pretty good. It’s not cloudy, Passover ends tonight, there are curly fries at residential college lunch. But all that stuff pales in comparison to unbelievably big deal writer Salman Rushdie’s talk on our very own campus this afternoon.

This is actually huge. Knighted by Queen Elizabeth in 2007 for his service to literature, Rushdie has received tons of awards for his writing, including the Booker Prize, the Booker of Bookers (for the best novel among the Booker Prize winners for Fiction awarded at the prize’s 25th anniversary), the Whitbread Prize for Best Novel (twice), and so many more. His work has been translated into over 40 languages.

We’re looking forward to hearing about the massive controversy surrounding Rushdie’s fourth novel, The Satanic Verses, which produced protests from Muslims in several countries in addition to death threats and a fatwā issued by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the Supreme Leader of Iran. Also, we’d be interested to hear Rushdie’s thoughts on the process of writing and about his forays into the Twitter universe.

The event is today at 4:30 p.m. in the Robert L. McNeil Lecture Hall at the YUAG (1111 Chapel St). It will be hosted by the Politic, and will include a Q&A session, so come prepared. Cyathur!