The Satanic Verses a reflection of the author’s dilemmas." The work is an "albeit surreal, record of its own author's continuing identity crisis." Ally said that the book reveals the author ultimately as "the victim of nineteenth-century British colonialism." Rushdie himself spoke confirming this interpretation of his book, saying that it was not about Islam, "but about migration, metamorphosis, divided selves, love, death, London and Bombay." He has also said "It's a novel which happened to contain a castigation of Western materialism. The tone is comic." After the "Satanic Verses" controversy developed, some scholars familiar with the book and the whole of Rushdie's
The Satanic Verses target in the events that led to the Sivas massacre on 2 July 1993 in Sivas, Turkey, which resulted in 37 deaths. In September 2012, Rushdie expressed doubt that "The Satanic Verses" would be published today because of a climate of "fear and nervousness". In March 2016, PEN America reported that the bounty for the Rushdie fatwa was raised by $600,000 (£430,000). Top Iranian media contributed this sum, adding to the existing $2.8m already offered. In response, the Swedish Academy, which awards the Nobel prize for literature, denounced the death sentence and called it "a serious violation of free speech."