Salman Rushdie is attacked onstage in Western New York.

CHAUTAUQUA, N.Y. — Salman Rushdie spent years in hiding after the management of Iran known as for his dying following the publication of his novel “The Satanic Verses.” However in recent times, declaring “Oh, I’ve to reside my life,” he re-entered society, usually showing in public round New York Metropolis with out evident safety.

On Friday morning, any sense that threats to his life have been a factor of the previous was dispelled when an attacker rushed the stage of Chautauqua Establishment right here in Western New York, the place Mr. Rushdie was scheduled to present a speak about the USA as a protected haven for exiled writers. The assailant stabbed Mr. Rushdie, 75, within the stomach and the neck, the police and witnesses stated, straining to proceed the assault at the same time as a number of folks held him again.

Mr. Rushdie was taken by helicopter to a close-by hospital in Erie, Pa., the place he was in surgical procedure for a number of hours on Friday afternoon. Mr. Rushdie’s agent, Andrew Wylie, stated Friday night that Mr. Rushdie was on a ventilator and couldn’t communicate.

“The information is just not good,” Mr. Wylie stated in an electronic mail. “Salman will possible lose one eye; the nerves in his arm have been severed; and his liver was stabbed and broken.”

Main Eugene J. Staniszewski of the New York State Police recognized the suspect within the assault as Hadi Matar, a 24-year-old New Jersey man who was arrested on the scene, however stated at a information convention late Friday afternoon that there was no indication but of a motive.

He stated that the police have been working with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the native sheriff’s workplace and that investigators have been within the means of acquiring search warrants for a backpack and digital gadgets that have been discovered on the establishment.

The assault shocked onlookers, who had gathered within the 4,000-seat amphitheater on the Chautauqua Establishment, a summertime vacation spot for literary and humanities programming.

“It took like 5 males to drag him away and he was nonetheless stabbing,” stated Linda Abrams, who attended the lecture within the entrance row. “He was simply livid, livid. Like intensely sturdy and simply quick.”

Others described blood operating down Mr. Rushdie’s cheek and pooling on the ground. A doctor in attendance, Rita Landman, stated that Mr. Rushdie appeared to have a number of stab wounds, together with one on the correct aspect of his neck, however that individuals surrounding him have been saying, “he has a pulse, he has a pulse.”

Ralph Henry Reese, 73, who was onstage with Mr. Rushdie to average the dialogue, suffered an damage to his face throughout the assault and was launched from the hospital on Friday afternoon, the police stated.

The brazen assault on Mr. Rushdie shook the literary world. Suzanne Nossel, the chief government officer of PEN America, which promotes free expression, stated in a press release that “we will consider no comparable incident of a public assault on a literary author on American soil.”

After he was launched from the hospital, Mr. Reese stated in a press release that Mr. Rushdie was “one of many nice authors of our time and one of many nice defenders of freedom of speech and freedom of artistic expression.”

“We revere him and our paramount concern is for his life,” stated Mr. Reese. “The truth that this assault might happen in the USA is indicative of the threats to writers from many governments and from many people and organizations.”

Mr. Rushdie had successfully been residing below a dying sentence since 1989, about six months after the publication of his novel “The Satanic Verses,” which fictionalized components of the lifetime of the Prophet Muhammad with depictions that many Muslims discovered offensive and a few thought-about blasphemous.

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the Supreme Chief of Iran after the 1979 Iranian Revolution, issued a non secular edict referred to as a fatwa on Feb. 14, 1989, ordering Muslims to kill Mr. Rushdie. A value was placed on his head of a number of million {dollars}. Mr. Rushdie, who lived in London on the time, went into hiding, and moved right into a fortified protected home below the safety of the British police for a lot of the subsequent 10 years.

On Friday morning at round 10:47 a.m., Mr. Rushdie had simply sat down onstage with the dialogue’s moderator, Mr. Reese, the co-founder of a Pittsburgh nonprofit, Metropolis of Asylum, a residency program for exiled writers, when a person rushed the stage and attacked Mr. Rushdie, the police and a number of other witnesses stated. Viewers members gasped and leaped to their toes.

Mary Newsom, who attended the lecture, stated that some folks thought at first that it is likely to be a stunt. “Then it grew to become obvious that it was clearly not a stunt,” she stated.

A number of witnesses stated the attacker was capable of attain Mr. Rushdie simply, operating onstage and approaching him from behind. Chuck Koch, an legal professional from Ohio who owns a home in Chautauqua, was seated within the second row and ran onstage to assist subdue the attacker. Mr. Koch stated that a number of folks labored to separate the assailant from Mr. Rushdie, and have been ready to take action earlier than a uniformed officer arrived and positioned the attacker in handcuffs.

Because the attacker was being restrained, one other attendee, Bruce Johnson, noticed a knife fall to the ground, he stated.

Michael Hill, Chautauqua’s president, stated on the information convention on Friday afternoon that Mr. Matar had a move to entry the establishment’s grounds like all typical patron.

The assault was decried by literary figures and public officers. Markus Dohle, the chief government of Penguin Random Home, Mr. Rushdie’s writer, stated in a press release, “We’re deeply shocked and appalled to listen to of the assault.”

Prime Minister Boris Johnson of Britain stated in a Twitter post that he was “appalled that Sir Salman Rushdie has been stabbed whereas exercising a proper we should always by no means stop to defend.”

Gov. Kathy Hochul of New York stated on Twitter: “Immediately’s assault on Salman Rushdie was additionally an assault on a few of our most sacred values — the free expression of thought.”

Even earlier than the fatwa, “The Satanic Verses” was banned in plenty of international locations, together with Bangladesh, Sudan, Sri Lanka and India, the place Mr. Rushdie was born. He was barred from the nation for greater than a decade.

After the fatwa, a halfhearted apology from Mr. Rushdie, which he later regretted, was rejected by Iran.

Many died in protests towards its publication, together with 12 folks in a riot in Mumbai in February 1989 and 6 extra in one other riot in Islamabad. Books have been burned, and there have been assaults on bookstores. Individuals linked to the e-book have been additionally focused.

In July 1991, Hitoshi Igarashi, the novel’s Japanese translator, was stabbed to dying and its Italian translator, Ettore Capriolo, was badly wounded. In October 1993, William Nygaard, the novel’s Norwegian writer, was shot thrice outdoors his residence in Oslo and severely injured.

The fatwa was maintained by Iran’s authorities after the dying of Ayatollah Khomeini for practically a decade, till 1998, when Iranian President Mohammad Khatami, who was thought-about comparatively liberal, stated that Iran now not supported the killing. However the fatwa stays in place, reportedly with a bounty connected from an Iranian spiritual basis of some $3.3 million as of 2012.

In an interview with The Sunday Instances in 1995, shortly earlier than Mr. Rushdie’s first scheduled public look for the reason that fatwa — a panel in London the place he mentioned his new novel, “The Moor’s Final Sigh” — the writer addressed his return to writing after the conflagration over “The Satanic Verses.”

“Scripting this was a vital step for me,” he stated in that interview. “I had spent two and a half years speaking to politicians, which isn’t my favourite occupation. Then I spotted it was silly to let this unpleasant enterprise get in the way in which of what I like doing greatest. I needed to show to myself that I might take in what has occurred to me and transcend it. And now, no less than, I really feel that I’ve.”

Since then, Mr. Rushdie has printed eight novels and a 2012 memoir, “Joseph Anton,” concerning the fatwa. The title got here from the pseudonym he used whereas in hiding, taken from the primary names of Joseph Conrad and Anton Chekhov.

In recent times, Mr. Rushdie has loved a extra public life in New York Metropolis. In 2019, he spoke at a personal membership in Manhattan to advertise his novel, “Quichotte.” Safety on the occasion was relaxed, and Mr. Rushdie mingled with friends freely and had dinner with members of the membership afterward.

Iran has not but formally commented on the assault towards the writer.

However supporters of the federal government took to social media to reward the stabbing towards Mr. Rushdie because the ayatollah’s fatwa lastly materializing. Some wished for him to die. Some warned that comparable destiny awaits different enemies of the Islamic Republic.

A quote by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei courting again a number of years was broadly shared, through which he says the fatwa towards Mr. Rushdie was “fired like a bullet that received’t relaxation till it hits its goal.”

Ayad Akhtar, a author and the president of PEN America, who’s mates with Mr. Rushdie and considers “The Satanic Verses” an “important second” in fashionable literary historical past, stated he by no means noticed Mr. Rushdie carry alongside any type of safety element, whether or not at a theater, out to dinner or at a public occasion. Mr. Rushdie appeared completely snug out on the planet, he stated.

Jay Root reported from Chautauqua, N.Y., David Gelles from Putnam Valley, N.Y., Elizabeth A. Harris and Julia Jacobs from New York Metropolis. Further reporting was contributed by Steven Erlanger, Farnaz Fassihi, Jonah E. Bromwich and Edmund Lee.