Reading has become a simple luxury. Book clubs exist in the 2020s by members frantically listening to audio books at work to ‘catch up’ before the big night out. I’ve tried. I just can’t do it. I was once proudly presented with a Kindle so that I could move into the twenty-first century, but I must admit that after it had lost its charge following the festive season, it remained in my desk drawer, unused. Dusty. And then outdated. I’m terrible with technology and want a book that I can hold in my hands (and drop in the bath if needed). A book with the thrill of being the first person to bend its pages at right angles against its spine. Or, to be vaguely disquieted by the trail of crumbs wedged like insects, mummified in papyrus by its previous owner.

When reading as a child, I often had someone standing in front of me, yelling, and I would be none the wiser until their shadow fell over the page. I just couldn’t hear them; I was so completely absorbed. Now I rarely have the time to lose myself in another world. My need for immersion in a different reality is inadequately satisfied by glimpses of poets on Instagram and when I read the text lines of inspirational TikToks while frying dinner or parking outside the shops.