While doing voluntary work for the Reader Organisation, I met Jane, the director and founder of the Shared Reading model. She told me that literature had transformed her life. She immediately accepted my invitation to participate in the project, and also offered to help me find other people to interview. She said that reading Shikasta, by Doris Lessing, had been an awakening, and that it had changed her whole world-view, literally overnight. When I read the novel, I found it difficult to get into at first. As it were, I found it rewarding once I had worked my way into it. I was familiar with the aspects of Jane's story, having read an article about her prior to our meeting. The interview took place in a room in the attic of the Georgian mansion that is the home of the Reader.

In Medias Res: The Encounter with the Book

Thor: I am very happy that you are willing to take part, and also very excited to meet you. I always read in advance the book the person has stated was important for them. So I brought this along. (I produce my copy of Shikasta). What I want is for you tell me all about your experience. Also, if there is a passage that you remember, that stands out, would you like to read it for me, please?

Jane: Yes. There are quite a lot of passages. The first bit is in Doris Lessing's introduction, which is called Some Remarks, at the very beginning, and when I read this for the first time I was absolutely … an atheist. I don't think I would even describe myself as an agnostic, I just think I didn't like the idea of religions or God. I loved Doris Lessing and had been reading her novels for many years, so when I came across this paragraph, I was really shocked by it, and also deeply affected:

Shikasta has as its starting point, like many others of the genre [‘that's Sci-fi'], the Old Testament, it is our habit to dismiss the Old Testament altogether, because Jehovah, or Jahve, does not think or behave like a social worker. H. G. Wells said that when man cries out his little ‘gimme, gimme me, gimme’ to God, it is as if a leveret were to snuggle up to a lion on a dark night.