LONDON - Canadian author Margaret Atwood is questioning her decision to pull out of a Dubai literary festival, saying she may have acted without knowing all the facts.
  
In the British newspaper the Guardian's "This Week in Books" column, she wrote Saturday that "my head is spinning."

Atwood said a week before her planned departure for the literary festival, that British author Geraldine Bedell claimed her novel "The Gulf Between Us" had been "banned" and "censored" for containing "among other things - the whiff of a mention of a gay sheikh."

Atwood said she got the impression from media reports that Bedell's book had been scheduled to launch at the Dubai festival and the launch had then been cancelled and the book had been banned throughout the Gulf states.

She said she also understood Bedell had been prohibited from attending the festival and travelling in Dubai.

"I was greatly looking forward to the festival and to the chance to meet readers there; but, as an International Vice-President of PEN -- an organization concerned with the censorship of writers -- I cannot be part of the festival this year," Atwood said announcing her withdrawal in a letter, posted on her website.

"This was a case for Anti-Censorship Woman!" Atwood wrote in the Guardian column Saturday.

"I nipped into the nearest phone booth, hopped into my cape and coiled my magic lasso and swiftly cancelled my own appearance."

"As a vice-president of International PEN, I could not give my August Seal of Elderly Writer Approval to such a venue," Atwood quipped.

"Well done, Anti-Censorship Woman! was the response. How stalwart!"

"But possibly not."

Atwood said when she spoke with the festival's director, Isobel Abulhoul, she was told Bedell's book was not scheduled to be launched at the festival and thus no launch had been cancelled.

Abulhoul said Bedell's publisher Penguin had asked for the launch and she had commented that this was a little-known writer who would not ordinarily be accorded that kind of slot.

But she asked to see the manuscript and on the basis of that, she passed.

Atwood said: "This happens every day at every festival in the world. Publishers always want to launch or feature their authors and all festivals pick and choose."

"Usually, however...they don't give the real reasons for their rejections."

Atwood chalked the problems up to Abulhoul's inexperience.

"She was candid. She sent her actual reactions in an email."

"She thought the exchange was frank and also confidential. She thought all parties were acting in good faith."

"Silly her. So goes her version."

Atwood said all of this happened last September.

"The little golden time bomb of a refusal-with-reasons was carefully guarded by someone - who? - until now, when it was hurled into the press to great publicity effect, easily stampeding people like me."

Atwood went on to ask whether Bedell was invited and then disinvited to the festival.

She wrote that Abulhoul said that Bedell never answered the letter of invitation in the first place. Penguin says maybe she was invited personally but they don't know.

"Is the book banned from the festival? No, says Abulhoul," Atwood wrote.

"Is it banned in Dubai? No, says Abulhoul."

But Atwood says Penguin insists they were told it is by a bookseller in Dubai.

"Is the author banned? No, says Abulhoul."

"Is the book banned in the Gulf States? Who knows? It's not even published until April."

Atwood concludes the column with: "So what do I do now? Having leapt into this dog's breakfast, I have it all over my face."

 "I am considering my options. Should I - for instance - appear at the festival on video screen?"

"Or are there yet more twists and turns to this story?"

The Ottawa-born Atwood, who has published more than 40 books including fiction, poetry and non-fiction, is no stranger to controversy with her own works.

Her 1985 novel "The Handmaid's Tale," which depicts a futuristic world where women are breeders, has often been challenged for being included in libraries and school curricula.