Sir Salman Rushdie had two police officers guarding him but it was crowd who tackled the knifeman after he was repeatedly stabbed, witnesses claim.
The 75-year-old has been taken off his ventilator and is talking as he recovers from being stabbed in the US.
British-American writer Aatish Taseer said, in a since-deleted tweet, that he was "off the ventilator and talking (and joking)", which was then confirmed by the author's agent Andrew Wylie.
