Literary Smackdowns: Salman Rushdie Versus Everyone

Over in the Twitterverse, literary giant Salman Rushdie often runs 'Literary Smackdowns' where his followers can vote as to which famous author is better - for example, Fitzgerald v Hemingway; Thomas Pynchon v David Foster Wallace, match-ups like that.  

But noticeably absent from these "smackdowns" is Rushdie himself. Time to correct this - lace up the gloves, Salman, you're going up against some of the mightiest wordsmiths the world has to offer.

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OK, this one is a bit unfair - not many authors in history can match it with Rushdie's idol James Joyce, and Salman doesn't even have the benefit of being dead to lend his words more weight. 'Midnight Children's' is undoubtedly 'An Important Book', but how can it compare to 'Ulysses', that great colossus of weighty literary ambition? Joyce wins in a knockout, so let's give Salman an opponent that is more in his league, someone like ...

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Worshippers at the altar of Rushdie might scoff at the thought of fellow Booker Prize winner Aravind Adiga being able to match it with Sir Salman, since Adiga is pretty much only known for one book. But man, what a book! 'The White Tiger' is thrilling from the first page to the last, whereas I'm pretty sure I snoozed through great swabs of 'Midnight's Children', as impressive as it is. Sorry, I have to give this one to Adiga. But staying on the theme of authors with Indian heritage, let's try this match-up ...

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Well, we all know who looks better (Rushdie's ability to marry glamourous women notwithstanding), but this is an equal opportunity contest, and we have to focus only on the words on the page.  I have to give Salman this one; Jhumpa Lahiri is a fine author, but she rarely speaks for more than a household of people whereas Rushdie aims to speak for an entire nation. I'm sure that assessment will get me in trouble with any readers majoring in feminist studies, so let's quickly move along to the next match-up.

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I thought I'd try this one since both Rushdie and Neil Gaiman are both quite visible in the Twitterverse. Again, speaking in a heterosexual way here, Salman loses out on looks, but I can't really rate a Hugo Award winner over the guy who wrote the most acclaimed Booker-winning novel ever, as much as I like Gaiman's 'Sandman' stuff. That's 2 wins and 2 losses for Rushdie, so we need an ultimate smackdown to decide this. Hmm, how about:

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On second thought, let's leave this one alone ...