The Satanic Verses controversy Rushdie's book" began with the title itself. The title refers to a legend of the Islamic Prophet Mohammad, when a few verses were supposedly spoken by him as part of the Qur'an, and then withdrawn on the grounds that the devil had sent them to deceive Mohammad into thinking they came from God. These "Satanic Verses" are found in verses eighteen to twenty-two in surah An-Najim of the Qur'an, and by accounts from Tabari, but is seldom mentioned in the first biography of Mohammad by Ibn Ishaq. The verses also appear in other accounts of the prophet's life. They permitted
The Satanic Verses controversy of the book's publication, and the book is Viking's all-time best seller. The author of the book himself was not killed or injured as many militants wished, but visibly frustrated by a life locked in 24-hour armed guard – alternately defiant against his would-be killers and attempting overtures of reconciliation against the death threat. A week after the death threat, and after his unsuccessful apology to the Iranian government, Rushdie described succumbing to "a curious lethargy, the soporific torpor that overcomes ... while under attack"; then, a couple of weeks after that, wrote a poem vowing "not to shut up"