Philip Pullman has joined a chorus of criticism over Penguin’s decision to pulp all remaining copies of a contentious book on Hinduism.
Pullman, who wrote the hugely successful His Dark Materials trilogy, said destroying books was never the solution to a disagreement.
His comments came after fellow author Arundhati Roy wrote an open letter to Penguin Books India, condemning the publisher’s decision to withdraw the book from sale.
The Hindus: An Alternative History, by US scholar Wendy Doniger, had caused offence with alleged inaccuracies and its interpretation of the faith, prompting legal action from a group of fundamentalist Hindu academics.
Roy, who won the Booker Prize with The God of Small Things, said Penguin had betrayed its history as a campaigner for free speech.
She wrote: “Now, even though there was no fatwa, no ban, not even a court order, you have not only caved in, you have humiliated yourself abjectly before a fly-by-night outfit by signing settlement. Why?” Pullman, president of the Society of Authors, said the response looked “very cowardly” and set a “dangerous precedent”.
“If we start to pulp books it will never end,” he said. “If you’re offended, there are ways to deal with it.
“You have a right to reply. But you don’t just try to shut the other person up by taking them to court or making them pulp the books.”
In a statement, Penguin Books India repeated its belief in “every individual’s right to freedom of thought and expression”.
It blamed Indian law, which outlaws “hate speech” that might provoke discord between different religions, for making it “increasingly difficult for any Indian publisher to uphold international standards of free expression”.
