British author hits back in row over call for Muslims to 'suffer'

0 Comments | AFP, October, 2007

LONDON (AFP) — British author Martin Amis on Friday hit back at criticism of remarks he made more than a year ago calling for Muslims to "suffer" to prompt them to steer their children away from Islamist militancy.

Amis' remarks, which drew fire from renowned Marxist literary critic Terry Eagleton, were made in September 2006, days after an alleged terror plot involving the blowing up of trans-Atlantic airliners was foiled, and on the eve of the fifth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

Amis noted in a letter to The Guardian and to Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, a columnist for The Independent, that the comments Eagleton attributed to him had not been made in an essay he published as Eagleton had written, but in an interview with The Sunday Times that...