In an interview two weeks ago, he said, “Now it seems that I have returned to my normal life”
Salman Rushdie (75), the writer of ‘Devil’s Poem’, is said to have improved enough to be able to have a conversation with the ventilator on the day following being attacked.
According to foreign media such as the AP on the 13th (local time), Rushdi’s fellow writer Atishi Tashir posted on Twitter that evening, “Rushdi took off the ventilator and was talking (he is also joking).”
Rushdie’s agent, Andrew Wiley, also confirmed the information.
No other specific information was mentioned.
Rushdie was stabbed in the neck and stomach by a knife wielded by a man in his 20s who rushed to the stage while preparing a lecture at a literature festival held in Shutterquare, New York the day before.
Rushdie, who was seriously injured, was taken to a nearby hospital and underwent surgery, shortly following Wiley revealed that he was on a ventilator.
Wiley also said that Rushdie’s arm nerves were severed, his liver was damaged and he was likely to lose one eye.
Rushdi has suffered death threats for decades as he faced fierce accusations from the Muslim world for his disrespectful portrayal of the Islamic prophet Muhammad in his 1988 novel The Devil’s Poem.
It is known that he said, “It seems that I have returned to my normal life now,” in a media interview just two weeks before this incident, making it even more pitiful.
He said in an interview with the German news magazine Stern, that life would have been much more dangerous if social media had existed when he was writing the devil’s poem.
Referring to 1989 when Iran’s then-supreme leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, proclaimed a ‘fatwa’ (interpretation of Islamic law) urging him to be killed, he said, “Fatwa is serious.
Fortunately, there was no internet at that time.
Iranians faxed Fatwa to the mosque, but that’s a thing of the past.
These days, my life has become very normal once more.”
When asked regarding what he fears now, he said, “In the past, I would have said I was a religious fanatic, but I don’t say that anymore.
“The biggest risk we face right now is the loss of democracy,” he added.
/yunhap news
