Salman Rushdie, a bestselling novelist whose books have received death threats, was stabbed in the neck and abdomen on Friday as he prepared to deliver a lecture at the Chautauqua Institution in western New York.
Author Salman Rushdie was reportedly on a ventilator Friday night with a damaged liver, cut nerves in an arm, and a potentially lost eye, according to Rushdie’s agent Andrew Wylie of The Wylie Agency.
The Arrested Suspect
A state trooper assigned to the event, according to New York police, arrested a suspect following the attack. Hadi Matar, a 24-year-old from Fairview, New Jersey, was revealed as the suspect in a news conference on Friday afternoon.
About Salman Rushdie
Rushdie is a British-American author of Indian descent. Six of his novels are USA TODAY bestsellers. He has written more than a dozen books. Since the late 1980s, his novel “The Satanic Verses” has been prohibited in Iran; many Muslims view it as blasphemous.
Following the publication of the book, Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a fatwa, or edict, demanding Rushdie’s execution.
Although the Iranian government had long since distanced itself from Khomeini’s order, animosity for Rushdie persisted. Rushdie’s reward was increased from $2.8 million to $3.3 million in 2012 by a semi-official Iranian religious institution.
It is unclear whether the attack on Friday was somehow related to the directive.
“Quichotte,” Rushdie’s most recent book, was released in the year 2019. Rushdie satirizes former President Donald Trump’s America with a contemporary Don Quixote in this adaptation of the Miguel de Cervantes classic. The novel was on the Booker Prize long list.
