Salman Rushdie’s agent says he’s off ventilator and talking; attacker pleads not guilty

Salman Rushdie, the author of “The Satanic Verses,” was taken off a ventilator and able to speak Saturday, a day after he was stabbed as he prepared to give a lecture in upstate New York.

Rushdie was still in the hospital with serious injuries, but fellow author Aatish Taseer tweeted later that night that he was “off the ventilator and talking (and joking).” Andrew Wylie, Rushdie’s agent, confirmed the information without providing any further details.

Earlier in the day, the man accused of assaulting him at the Chautauqua Institution, a nonprofit education and retreat centre, pleaded not guilty to attempted murder and assault charges in what a prosecutor described as a “preplanned” crime.

During an arraignment in western New York, Hadi Matar’s attorney entered the plea on his behalf. The suspect appeared in court with his hands cuffed in front of him, wearing a black and white jumpsuit and a white face mask.

A judge ordered him held without bail after District Attorney Jason Schmidt told her that Matar, 24, purposefully put himself in a position to harm Rushdie by obtaining an advance pass to the event where the author was speaking and arriving a day early bearing a fake ID.

“This was a premeditated, unprovoked attack on Mr. Rushdie,” Schmidt said.

According to public defender Nathaniel Barone, authorities took too long to get Matar in front of a judge, leaving him “hooked up to a bench at the state police barracks.”

“He has the constitutional right to be presumed innocent,” said Barone.

According to Wylie, Rushdie, 75, suffered a damaged liver as well as nerve damage in an arm and an eye. He would almost certainly lose the injured eye.

Much of the world reacted with shock and outrage, as well as tributes and praise for the award-winning author, who has faced death threats for “The Satanic Verses” for more than 30 years.

Authors, activists and government officials cited Rushdie’s courage and longtime advocacy of free speech despite the risks to his own safety. Writer and longtime friend Ian McEwan called Rushdie “an inspirational defender of persecuted writers and journalists across the world,” and actor-author Kal Penn cited him as a role model “for an entire generation of artists, especially many of us in the South Asian diaspora toward whom he’s shown incredible warmth.”

In a statement issued Saturday, President Joe Biden said he and First Lady Jill Biden were “shocked and saddened” by the attack.

“With his insight into humanity, his unrivalled sense of story, and his refusal to be intimidated or silenced,” the statement said, “Salman Rushdie stands for essential, universal ideals.” “Truth. Courage. Resilience. The ability to freely share ideas. These are the foundations of any free and open society.”

Rushdie, an Indian native who has since lived in the United Kingdom and the United States, is known for his surreal and satirical prose style, which began with his Booker Prize-winning 1981 novel “Midnight’s Children,” in which he sharply criticised India’s then-prime minister, Indira Gandhi.

After “The Satanic Verses” was published in 1988, it drew death threats, with many Muslims considering a dream sequence based on the life of the Prophet Muhammad to be blasphemy, among other objections. Before Iran’s Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a fatwa, or edict, calling for Rushdie’s death in 1989, his book had already been banned and burned in India, Pakistan, and elsewhere.

Khomeini died the following year, but the fatwa is still in effect. Though Iran hasn’t focused on the writer in recent years, Iran’s current supreme leader, Khamenei, never issued his own fatwa withdrawing the edict.

Investigators were attempting to determine whether the suspect, who was born a decade after the publication of “The Satanic Verses,” acted alone.

In arguing against bail, District Attorney Schmidt alluded to the fatwa as a possible motivation.

“Even if this court were to set a million dollars bail, we stand a risk that bail could be met,” Schmidt said.

“His resources don’t matter to me. We understand that the agenda that was carried out yesterday is something that was adopted and it’s sanctioned by larger groups and organizations well beyond the jurisdictional borders of Chautauqua County,” the prosecutor said.

After the hearing, public defender Barone stated that Matar has been communicating openly with him and that he will spend the next few weeks learning about his client, including whether he has psychological or addiction issues.

Matar was born in Fairview, New Jersey. Matar joined the State of Fitness Boxing Club in nearby North Bergen on April 11 and participated in about 27 group sessions for beginners looking to improve their fitness before emailing her several days ago to cancel his membership because “he wouldn’t be coming back for a while,” according to Rosaria Calabrese, manager of the small, tightly knit gym.

Gym owner Desmond Boyle said he saw “nothing violent” about Matar, describing him as polite and quiet, yet someone who always looked “tremendously sad.” He said Matar resisted attempts by him and others to welcome and engage him.

“He had this look every time he came in. It looked like it was the worst day of his life,” Boyle said.

Matar was born in the United States to parents who emigrated from Yaroun in southern Lebanon, according to the mayor of the village, Ali Tehfe.

Flags of the Iran-backed Shia militant group Hezbollah, as well as portraits of leader Hassan Nasrallah, Khamenei, Khomeini, and slain Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani, can be seen throughout the village.

On Saturday, journalists visiting Yaroun were asked to leave. Requests for comment from Hezbollah representatives were not returned.

Iran’s theocratic government and state-run media gave no explanation for the attack. Some Iranians interviewed by the AP in Tehran praised the attack on an author they believe has harmed the Islamic faith, while others were concerned that it will further isolate their country.

According to police, event moderator Henry Reese, 73, suffered a facial injury and was treated and released from the hospital. He and Rushdie intended to talk about the United States as a safe haven for writers and other artists in exile.

A state trooper and a county sheriff’s deputy were assigned to Rushdie’s lecture, and the trooper made the arrest, according to police. However, some long-time Chautauqua Institution visitors questioned why there wasn’t tighter security given the threats against Rushdie and a $3 million bounty on his head.

The centre announced on Saturday that it was beefing up security by requiring photo IDs to purchase gate passes, which were previously available anonymously. Bags of any kind will be prohibited from being carried into the amphitheatre where Rushdie was attacked.

The changes, as well as an increased presence of armed police officers on the bucolic grounds, came as a surprise to Chautauquans, who have long enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere for which the nearly 150-year-old vacation colony is known.

The stabbing has reignited interest in “The Satanic Verses,” which topped best-seller lists following the fatwa’s issuance in 1989. The novel was ranked No. 13 on Amazon.com as of Saturday afternoon.

Rushdie went into hiding under a British government protection programme that included an armed guard around the clock after receiving death threats and a bounty for the book’s publication. Rushdie cautiously resumed public appearances after nine years of seclusion.

In 2012, he published “Joseph Anton,” the pseudonym he used while in hiding, a memoir about the fatwa.

During a talk in New York that year, he said that terrorism was really an art of fear: “The only way to defeat it is to decide not to be afraid.”