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The Indian-born British writer, Salman Rushdie, is a world-renowned essayist and novelist. He’s known for his sensational works with political and religious undertones, and at one point in his career, he went into hiding due to his writings. More recently, in August 2022, he was stabbed in New York. Here’s what to know about the author’s controversial works, plus, a bit about Salman Rushdie’s net worth in 2022.

What is Salman Rushdie’s net worth in 2022?

Salman Rushdie speaking
Salman Rushdie | Gilbert Carrasquillo/Getty Images

Britannica notes Salman Rushdie was born in June 1947 in India, and he published his first novel in 1975. By 1981, he received critical acclaim and the Booker Prize for his novel, Midnight’s Children, and he later adapted the novel into a screenplay in 2012. While his third novel, Shame, proved successful as well, his fourth novel, The Satanic Verses, published in 1988, drew deep criticism. Muslim community leaders in Britain denounced the book, and by 1989, Iranian political and spiritual leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, had a bounty on Rushdie for his execution. This forced the writer into hiding.

Even in hiding, Rushdie continued to produce work. He wrote the collection Imaginary Homelands in 1991, a children’s book named Haroun and the Sea of Stories in 1990, the short-story collection East, West in 1994, and The Moor’s Last Sigh in 1995. After his days of hiding were behind him, he continued to write and produce new books and stories.

As for his personal life, he married Top Chef host Padma Lakshmi in 2004 and they divorced in 2007.

So, what is Salman Rushdie’s net worth in 2022? According to The Richest, he’s currently worth about $15 million.

When did Salman Rushdie come out of hiding?

Salman Rushdie
Salman Rushdie | Thomas Lohnes/Getty Images

Salman Rushdie’s net worth might be high due to his incredible success as a writer and communicator, but sharing his ideas still put him in great danger. He went into hiding in 1989 and spent many years in a remote farmhouse in Wales, The Guardian reports. Rushdie also lived with the alias Joseph Anton to further protect him. He published a memoir with his alias as the title in 2012.

Rushdie expressed remorse over The Satanic Verses in 1989 and 1990, but to no avail. By 1997, Sayyid Mohammad Khatami, a reformist Iranian president, called for the world to allow Rushdie to live, but Rushdie didn’t partially leave hiding until four years later. By September 2001, Rushdie appeared more in public, and he dropped his alias. As for The Satanic Verses, the writer says he has no regrets about the book.

With that in mind, in 2016, 40 state-run media organizations in Iran still wanted to see Rushdie dead. They upheld the bounty and raised it to $600,000. Rushdie remained in police protection afterward.

He was stabbed in the neck during an event in New York City in August 2022

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According to The New York Times, Salman Rushdie was stabbed in the neck on Friday, Aug. 12, 2022, at 11 a.m. He went on stage to give a lecture at the Chautauqua Institution. The police statement notes the writer was rushed to the hospital via helicopter after the attack, and his agent stated he was in surgery. The motivation for the attack remains unclear at this time.

According to a witness sitting in the front row of the event, the attacker continued to attempt to stab Rushdie even after police restrained him. “It took like five men to pull him away and he was still stabbing,” she said. “He was just furious, furious. Like intensely strong and just fast.”

“There was a huge security lapse,” another witness noted. “That somebody could get that close without any intervention was frightening.”

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