Salman Rushdie

Awards & Honours

Awards Won

Honours

Rankings

Covers

Records

Salman Rushdie's career is marked by extraordinary literary achievements and historic recognitions. Midnight's Children is the only novel to have won the Booker of Bookers twice, voted the best Booker winner in both 1993 and 2008. He was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 2007, one of the highest honors for a British writer. In 2023, Time named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world. His 2024 memoir Knife became an instant bestseller, praised for its unflinching account of survival. Over his career, he has received more than twenty honorary doctorates and lifetime achievement awards from organizations including PEN America and the German Publishers and Booksellers Association.

AwardsRushdie won the Booker Prize in 1981 for Midnight's Children, which was twice named the Booker of Bookers (1993 and 2008). He received the French Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger for Shame, the Whitbread Novel Award for The Satanic Verses, and the PEN Pinter Prize in 2014. In 2023 he was awarded the Friedenspreis des Deutschen Buchhandels. He holds over twenty honorary doctorates and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

Honours & Distinctions

Knight Bachelor

Queen Elizabeth II·2007

Knighted for services to literature.

Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature

Royal Society of Literature·1983

Elected as a Fellow.

Commander of the Order of Arts and Letters

French Ministry of Culture·1999

Awarded for contributions to literature.

Doctor of Humane Letters

Indiana University·2018

Honorary doctorate.

Time 100 Most Influential People

Time Magazine·2023

Listed among the world's most influential people.

Rankings & Lists

Booker of Bookers

Booker Prize Foundation·2008

Booker of Bookers

Booker Prize Foundation·1993

#90

Modern Library 100 Best Novels

Modern Library·1999

#Listed

Time 100 Most Influential People

Time Magazine·2023

Magazine Covers

Time

1989-02-27

Salman Rushdie: The Fatwa Cover

The New Yorker

1995-12-25

The First Life of Salman Rushdie

Vanity Fair

2007-06

Salman Rushdie's New Life

Time

2023-04-13

Time 100: Salman Rushdie

Records & Feats

Only novel to win the Booker of Bookers twice

Literary Award·2008

Midnight's Children was voted the best Booker Prize winner in both 1993 and 2008.

Longest-running fatwa against a living author

Historic First·1989

The death sentence issued by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1989 remained in effect for over three decades.