Why did he want to read it?
Referring to John Cleese-— reading Screwtape Letters? Because it was a national broadcast at some point, and he was on contract with BBC and it paid well in the broadcast residuals aside from scale hourly pay to do it. The listening data showed record number of people listening in— however they were determining this number. Residuals could add up to multiples of the original counted in the contract-— they all wanted to hear John Cleese, so they paid the ticket for the hall live and then bought the later recordings. Great pay for reading a novel