MUMBAI, Oct. 11 -- Twenty-seven seconds: On the clock, it is less than half of a minute, and a little more than a quarter of one. Nothing exceptional can possibly occur in such little time. Unless, of course, you enjoy poetry - "you could read aloud one of Shakespeare's sonnets, the one about the summer's day," novelist Salman Rushdie wrote in his memoir, Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder. The romantic reflection on time is abruptly marred by a more terrifying 27-second memory-his encounter with a would-be assassin on August 12, 2022 at the amphitheatre of the Chautauqua Institution in New York State, where he was ironically slated to talk about "the importance of keeping writers safe from harm". Rushdie would escape death by a whisker and permanently lost vision in his right eye. The account of that incident and its aftermath is now being brought to life on stage by Motley Productions. Titled 27 Seconds, the play starring Naseeruddin Shah as Rushdie and Malaika Choudhury as his wife Rachel Eliza Griffiths, alongside an ensemble cast, will open at the Prithvi Theatre Festival next month. "I have been an admirer of Naseer's for a very long time. I'm delighted he has taken on this project," Rushdie told HT in an email interview....