InkBlog

Salman Rushdie is 75 years old and an award-winning author. He’s Indian, and he lived in England for decades, then moved to the US in 2000. He’s lived primarily in New York for more than two decades. Part of the reason for his move to New York was the feeling that it was “safer” for him in the US. He’s lived under a fatwa since 1989, shortly after the publication of The Satanic Verses. Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini issued the fatwa because of the outrage over the book, which is about Islam and the prophet Mohammed.

I’m sure Rushdie has felt under threat every day since 1989, but I’m also sure that he has moments where he is able to let his guard down, where he thinks he’s among friends and colleagues and students. Perhaps that’s how he felt on Friday when he traveled to Chautauqua, New York to give a talk about, ironically enough, how America is a safe haven for exiled writers. While Rushdie was on stage at the Chautauqua Institution, a man rushed on stage with a knife of some kind. The assailant stabbed Rushdie repeatedly in his neck, face and abdomen. Even as people held the assailant back, he was still trying to stab Rushdie. Rushdie was taken to a hospital in Erie, Pennsylvania by helicopter. His agent, Andrew Wylie, told media outlets that “The news is not good. Salman will likely lose one eye; the nerves in his arm were severed; and his liver was stabbed and damaged.”

Salman Rushdie is facing a grim recovery. The renowned author, 75, has been placed on a ventilator and cannot speak, his literary agent Andrew Wylie told The New York Times in an update on his condition after he was attacked and stabbed on stage Friday during a literary festival at New York’s Chautauqua Institution.

“The news is not good,” said Wiley. “Salman will likely lose one eye, the nerves in his arm were severed, and his liver was stabbed and damaged.”

A rep for Rushdie did not immediately respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment.

Rushdie was stabbed “at least once in the neck and at least once in the abdomen,” New York State Police said in a news conference, after a man, later identified by police as 24-year-old Hadi Matar, rushed the lecture stage and attacked the Satanic Verses author and Ralph Henry Reese, who sustained a minor head injury. Rushdie was airlifted to a nearby hospital.

New York State Police took Matar into custody after the attack, according to the Associated Press. Investigating with the FBI and the local sheriff’s office, authorities requested a search warrant for a backpack and electronic devices found at the Chautauqua Institution.

Author Carl LeVan described the scene on Twitter, noting that Rushdie “was stabbed multiple times before [the] attacker was subdued by security” and the audience was evacuated.

[From People]

The assailant was taken into custody at the scene of the crime, and on Saturday, he was charged with attempted murder and assault by the New York State Police. The state police are getting help from the FBI as well as law enforcement goes through the tedious task of reviewing the 24-year-old assailant’s digital and social history. They’re going to want to know if he went to a local mosque or if he told anyone of his plans to attack Rushdie. They’re going to want to know if anyone helped him.

The literary community in America and the UK is really torn up about this attack. Many writers know and love Rushdie and he has always been supportive of emerging talent and writers of color. It’s heartbreaking to think that he went there, feeling safe and feeling like he was among his peers and his friends.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

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