This might be the jawdropper of the day, because the people who selected Sir Salman Rushdie for knighthood apparently were taken completely by surprise when the Islamic world went nuts.

The latest controversy over his knighthood appears to have shocked the people involved in nominating and selecting him.

Jonathan Heawood, director of the English branch of Pen, said: “We have argued for a long time that Salman Rushdie should be recognised by the government as a giant of world literature.

“I’ve been struggling for a form of words that does not sound naive but we were taken aback, everyone was taken aback, by the scale of the reaction.”