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U2 and Salman Rushdie

Robyn Beck, AFP | Getty Images

Salman Rushdie is to literature what Bono is to music (though the latter has only been threatened with a cock-punching, not a fatwa). So it's only fitting that after reading Rushdie's 1992 novel 'The Ground Beneath Her Feet' -- in which a mourning rock star composes a song for his dead lover -- Bono asked the author for permission to put those lyrics to song. Upon it's release, 'The Ground Beneath Her Feet' ended world hunger, cured all disease and brought peace to the planet. Not really, but it was included on the soundtrack to the Bono-produced and soon-forgotten film 'The Million Dollar Hotel.'