Mush, Chavez slam USA, sell books

New Delhi: Nothing sexes up book sales than sensation — Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf isn’t the only author who will give you that tip.

Professor Noam Chomsky wrote Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance in 2003, but Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez made it a bestseller with his speech at the UN last week.

At his talk on Wednesday, Chavez held up Chomsky's book and recommended it to everyone in the General Assembly, as well as to the American people. ''The people of the United States should read this ... instead of watching Superman movies,'' Chavez later told reporters.

Hegemony or Survival is currently on top of Amazon.com's bestseller list, after the Chavez plug last week.

The book leapt from 26,000 to number one following Chavez's speech in which he rallied against the US's "imperialism," saying "the hegemonic pretensions of the American empire are placing at risk the very survival of the human species."

Hegemony or Survival also dislodged the earlier number one by New York Times columnist Frank Rich The Greatest Story Ever Sold: The Decline and Fall of Truth from 9/11 to Katrina.

Chomsky’s work - though analytically researched - does not boast of great revelations. Musharraf does—for days now he has been making sensational revelations which are expected to do wonders for his memoir, In the Line of Fire, when it’s launched in New York on Monday.

Till now, Musharraf has alleged that the US threatened to bomb his country “back to stone age”, that India was responsible for the Kargil conflict and US paid millions of dollars to get al-Qaeda suspects. No wonder, the world wants to read the book.

According to The Hindu newspaper, copies of the book have been leaked and that the Prime Minister’s Office in New Delhi has got access to excerpts of the book on chapters dealing with Kashmir, including the Kargil standoff.

In a “startling revelation”, Musharraf claims not only was then prime minister Nawaz Sharif aware of the Pakistan army's plans and they even had a dry run before the incursions.

There are also reports of a Hindi translation - called Agnipath - being done in Delhi, which Musharraf personally wants to review.