Salman Rushdie, a well-known author, shared the first words he uttered once he was removed from a ventilator following a near-fatal stabbing incident. He spoke about this during his testimony in a New York court against the individual accused of the attack.
The accused, 27-year-old Hadi Matar, is facing charges of attempted murder and assault for assaulting Rushdie by stabbing him numerous times just before he was scheduled to deliver a speech in August 2022. Matar has entered a plea of not guilty.
As a result of the attack, the 77-year-old author lost vision in one eye and underwent a lengthy recovery process, which he documented in a memoir published last year. Another individual scheduled to share the stage with Rushdie was also injured in the incident.
The Satanic Verses author told the court he was put on a ventilator at a Pennsylvania hospital that he was flown to for 24 hours to stabilise him.
He revealed his first words after he was taken off the medical equipment were: ‘I could speak.’
Sir Salman also revealed his sewn-up eye to the jurors, telling them: ‘You can see that’s what’s left of it, there’s no vision in the eye at all.’
He told the court that he initially did not realise he had been stabbed, but quickly realised blood was ‘pouring onto my clothes’. Matar, he said ‘initially hit me very hard… around here on the lower part of my face my jawline and my neck.’
‘Initially I thought he’d punched me… I thought he was hitting me with his fist.’
Salman Rushdie (pictured in 2023) was blinded in one eye in the attack and spent months recovering
Hadi Matar (pictured, centre) is charged with attempted murder and assault for attacking Rushdie as he was preparing to give a speech in August 2022
Sir Salman said he remembers a ‘large quantity of blood pouring out onto my clothes’ while ‘he was hitting me repeatedly.. Stabbing and slashing’.
‘Everything happened very quickly so I’m not certain of the exact sequence of events,’ he added.
He admitted that he believed he was dying after the near-fatal attack.
‘It occurred to me quite clearly that I was dying, that was my predominant thought.
‘I was lying on the ground in pain… I was aware of a small pile of people to my right essentially subduing the attacker and thanks that I guess I survived.’
As he lay on the ground, he said he remembered There was a voice that called out asking for a pair of scissors to cut my clothes off me to see where the injuries were and where the blood was coming from.’
‘At some point I put up my left hand to try and protect myself and [Matar] stuck the knife in that,’ Sir Salman added.
The knife ‘severed all of the tendons of the hand’, he said, adding: ‘The hand is not really fully repaired yet.’
The author then talked through the other injuries he suffered, pointing to a ‘scar visible on the left hand side here, slash wound here’ as he ran his fingers from the left hand side of his mouth.
After the attack, he was flow via helicopter to a trauma unit at a Pennsylvania hospital, where he was put on a ventilator for 24 hours, which he said was necessary as it ‘was not clear that I could breathe without it.’
Once in the hospital, he said he realised he had suffered such a bad cut to his face that ‘it had to be held together by metal staples.’
Author Salman Rushdie is tended to after he was attacked during a lecture, Aug. 12, 2022, at the Chautauqua Institution in Chautauqua, New York
In this still image from video, author Salman Rushdie is taken on a stretcher to a helicopter for transport to a hospital after he was attacked during a lecture at the Chautauqua Institution in Chautauqua, N.Y., Friday, Aug. 12, 2022
British-American writer of Indian origin, Salman Rushdie (L), and Colombian writer, Juan Gabriel Vasquez, participate in a conversation during the second day of the 20th edition of the Hay Festival in Cartagena, Colombia, 31 January 2025
This still image from video shows Hadi Matar, of Fairview, N.J., at left, being escorted from the stage as people tend to author Salman Rushdie, center right, at the Chautauqua Institution in Chautauqua, N.Y., Aug. 12, 2022
He added that he was unable to sit up as he ‘also had lost an enormous amount of blood that left me extremely weak.’
Rushdie’s eye ‘was initially very badly swollen… that the eyelid couldn’t close, so it had to be constantly moisturised’, he said.
Doctors at the Pennsylvania hospital he was being treated at decided that it was only when the the swelling round his eye had died that he could undergo surgery.
‘I had this, again, quite painful operation to have my eyelid stitched up which I don’t recommend’, he wryly added.
The elderly writer admitted that he had still not fully recovered from the attack, putting himself at 75 or 80 percent.
He said he was not as ‘energetic’ or ‘strong’ as he used to be, and still does not have the full use of his left hand.
Rushdie said that while he can move it about, he only has feeling in his thumb and index finger.
Henry Reece, co-founder of City of Asylum, a nonprofit organisation that helps writers exiled from their countries for their controversial writing, was also attacked as he presented the event with Rushdie. He suffered a significant gash over his eye.
Matar has been in custody since he was subdued by spectators after the attack. He has pleaded not guilty to attempted murder and assault.
The trial is projected to last up to two weeks. Jurors are expected to be shown video and photos from the day of the attack.
They are unlikely, however, to hear about a fatwa issued by the late Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini calling for Rushdie’s death, according to District Attorney Jason Schmidt.
Rushdie released an book about his life after his attempted assassination titled ‘Knife’
Rushdie pictured with his wife Rachel Eliza Griffiths (pictured, left)
Salman Rushdie and Alan Yentob attend the Charles Finch & CHANEL Pre-BAFTA Party at 5 Hertford Street on March 12, 2022 in London, England
Rushdie, the author of ‘Midnight’s Children’ and ‘Victory City,’ spent years in hiding after Khomeini announced the fatwa in 1989 following publication of the novel ‘The Satanic Verses,’ which some Muslims consider blasphemous
Schmidt has said discussing Matar’s motive will be unnecessary in the state trial, given the attack was seen by the live audience that was present to hear Rushdie speak.
‘This is not a case of mistaken identity,’ Schmidt said during his opening statements on Monday. ‘Mr. Matar is the person who attacked Mr. Rushdie without provocation.’
A public defender representing Matar, however, told jurors that the case is not as straightforward as prosecutors made it out to be.
‘The elements of the crime are more than `something really bad happened’ – they’re more defined,’ Lynn Schaffer said. ‘Something bad did happen, something very bad did happen, but the district attorney has to prove much more than that.’
In a separate indictment, federal authorities allege that Matar was driven to act by a terrorist organisation’s 2006 endorsement of the fatwa. A later trial on federal terrorism charges will be scheduled in U.S. District Court in Buffalo.
More to follow.
