Poet Jillian Hanesworth recalls the day Salman Rushdie was stabbed

CHAUTAUQUA, N.Y. — Author Salman Rushdie is now blind in one eye after a brutal attack at Chautauqua in 2022.

Hadi Matar has pleaded not guilty to state charges of attempted murder and assault for the attack.

But Matar rejected a plea deal Tuesday in Chautauqua County Court. He would have had to plead guilty to a federal charge of attempting to provide material support to a terrorist organization.

Buffalo poet emeritus Jillian Hanesworth was at Chautauqua Institution for her first major lecture on the day of the attack. She was scheduled to follow Rushdie to a nearby lecture hall.

“I was pacing outside, listening to him, going over his key points in my head and it was “I just went left quickly,” she said. “All I remember is seeing someone running onto the stage and it looked like they were hitting him and I was like, ‘What are they hitting him?’ and then we started seeing blood.”

Hanesworth recently won an Emmy for his work. His talk was to focus on violence and hate after what happened in Buffalo on May 14, 2022.

For years, Rushdie’s life was threatened because of his writings. He was stabbed several times on a stage at the Chautauqua Institution.

Hanesworth is impressed with his return to work. In her words, “it wasn’t a knockout blow for him.”

Hanesworth finally gave his lecture the following year.

“It was an incredible experience to be there, but they were very attentive to what happened the last time I was there. They did everything they could to make me feel safe and comfortable,” she said.

The incident was unfortunate, but Hanesworth said, “Sometimes it takes an unfortunate event to happen for us to reexamine our policies and procedures, but they’ve adapted and I really appreciate their willingness to do that.”

Matar’s trial is scheduled to begin in September.

He is being held in the Chautauqua County Jail.