Alert: The spat between a society chronicler and acclaimed novelist Salman Rushdie has made the cover of the Post! Devorah Rose, a self-made wannabe celebrity (she's described as a "fameball" in this recent NY Tmes Styles piece), says of the former Mr. Padma Lakshmi, "Hanging out with him, you kind of feel like you’re with a 5-year-old genius... You’re at dinner, and he’s eating and basically hanging out with your boobs. His mind is smart, but his actions are infantile. His behavior is beastly."
For the past few days, Rose, née Deborah Denise Trachtenberg, editor of Social Life, has been explaining limerick-writing Rushdie had been pursuing her (see the photographic and Facebook evidence), as payback for Rushdie's remark that he was "mortified" to be connected to Rose. Rose told the Post, "What he did was verbally abusive. He knew the best way to hurt me."
Over the course of four lavish dinners and countless long conversations, Rose says she confided in Rushdie about her biggest insecurity: being portrayed as a fool in the press. (In a profile last summer, The New York Times described her place on the social scene as “the hanger-on whom no one likes.”)
“The best minds are unconventional,” she recalled Rushdie telling her. He encouraged her to pursue reality-television opportunities unabashedly.
“Walk through any door that opens,” was his career advice.
... As their relationship progressed, Rose said, she was uncomfortable because he clearly wanted a sexual relationship, and she wanted nothing more than friendship — and maybe an unpublished manuscript to read.
After four dinners and no sex, Rushdie finally threw in the towel.
“I’m sorry to say that I don’t feel able to pursue what we only just began,” he wrote on Facebook.
Even after stopping their Rose says Rushdie continued to comment on her sexy pictures (he said she was "hottt") and calls him a genius...in the way he ruined her life, "I never imagined he would take the information I had given him and use it as a weapon to deeply wound me. He’s a hurtful person. His was sadistic, violating behavior. I’m never again going to look up to someone I’m not close to. It doesn’t matter if a man is your idol, if a man makes you feel bad, you need to stand up for yourself. Women need to have a no-jerk policy. Women can’t let men play games with them. I just want girls to know they need to speak out and this type of behavior is not OK." But Rushdie loves "badassery!"
