After being attacked in the United States in August, Salman Rushdie lost vision in one eye and was left “incapable” in one hand, his agent revealed in an interview published this weekend.
Before delivering a speech in the state of New York, the 75-year-old author, who had received multiple death threats following the publishing of “The Satanic Verses,” was stabbed several times in the neck and belly.
Rushdie was then airlifted to a neighbouring hospital for emergency surgery, but within weeks his condition improved.
“He has lost vision in one eye… He had three serious neck injuries. Due to severed nerves in his arm, he has lost the use of one hand. And he has approximately fifteen more wounds in his chest and torso “Andrew Wylie told the Spanish newspaper, El Pais, that Rushdie’s health has improved.
“The injuries were severe… it was a vicious assault,” Wylie added.
He refused to disclose the writer’s location or if he was still in the hospital, but stated, “He’s going to live.”
After Iran’s first supreme leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini ordered the author’s execution for the blasphemous nature of “The Satanic Verses,” the British author spent years in hiding.
Hadi Matar, a 24-year-old from New Jersey with roots in Lebanon, was arrested shortly after the attack on Salman Rushdie and pled not guilty during a mid-August court in the state of New York.
The attack provoked condemnation in the West, while extremists in Muslim nations such as Iran and Pakistan hailed it.
