The author Salman Rushdie, who was stabbed roughly 10 times on Friday, has been removed from a ventilator and is on the mend, his agent said Sunday.
“The road to recovery has begun,” Andrew Wylie, the agent, said in a text message. “It will be long; the injuries are severe, but his condition is headed in the right direction.”
Mr. Rushdie, who had spent decades under proscription by Iran, was attacked onstage minutes before he was to give a talk at the Chautauqua Institution in western New York.
Hadi Matar, a 24-year-old New Jersey man, was arrested at the scene and charged with second-degree attempted murder and assault with a weapon.
In court on Saturday, prosecutors said that the attack on the author was premeditated and targeted. Mr. Matar traveled by bus to the intellectual retreat and purchased a pass that allowed him to attend the talk Mr. Rushdie was to give on Friday morning, according to the prosecutors.
Salman Rushdie’s Most Influential Work
Salman Rushdie’s Most Influential Work
“Midnight’s Children” (1981). Salman Rushdie’s second novel, about modern India’s coming-of-age, received the Booker Prize, and became an international success. The story is told through the life of Saleem Sinai, born at the very moment of India’s independence.
Nathaniel Barone, a public defender, entered a plea of not guilty on his behalf. Mr. Matar was held without bail, and his next court appearance is scheduled for Friday at 3 p.m.
Mr. Rushdie had been put on a ventilator the evening he was attacked, after undergoing hours of surgery at a hospital in Erie, Pa. Mr. Wylie said then that Mr. Rushdie might lose an eye, his liver had been damaged and the nerves in his arm were severed.
On Sunday, Mr. Rushdie’s son Zafar Rushdie said his father remained in critical condition and was receiving extensive treatment. He said the author was able to speak a few words.
“Though his life-changing injuries are severe, his usual feisty and defiant sense of humor remains intact,” Zafar Rushdie said in a statement. “We are so grateful to all the audience members who bravely leapt to his defense and administered first aid, along with the police and doctors who have cared for him and for the outpouring of love and support from around the world.”
Mr. Rushdie had been living under the threat of an assassination attempt since 1989, about six months after the publication of his novel “The Satanic…
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