‘Let us go then, you and I’: the opening line of T.S. Eliot’s poem The Love song of J. Alfred Prufrock sums up all the shades and nuances of the relationship between writer and reader: companion, counsellor, correspondent, fan, partner, fellow-sufferer. John Maytham performs excerpts by a range of writers, including Dante Alighieri, C.S. Lewis, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, James Joyce, Albert Camus and Joan Didion, in a celebration of the pleasures of reading compiled by Finuala Dowling.
