In an interview two weeks ago, he said, “Now it seems that I have returned to my normal life”
Salman Rushdi (75), the writer of ‘Devil’s Poem’, is said to have improved to the extent that he was able to have a conversation with the ventilator on the day following he was attacked with a knife.
“Rushdie’s ventilator has been removed and he is on the way to recovery,” Andrew Wiley, publishing agent at Rushdie, said in a statement. The Associated Press reported that he said.
Earlier, Rushdi’s fellow writer, Atishi Tashir, tweeted the evening before, “Rushdi took off the ventilator and was talking (he was also joking).”
Rushdi’s son, Jafar, said in a statement on behalf of the family, “Although the injury is serious, his father’s positive and challenging sense of humor is still alive.”
He then expressed his gratitude to the audience, police, and medical staff who helped his father during the lecture.
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.
He is known to have said in a media interview just two weeks before this incident, ‘It seems that he has returned to a normal life now’, and this is causing regret for the attack.
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 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
