Reading Remembrance of Things Past all the way through is not enough to appreciate Proust’s masterpiece (Letters, 26 September). You need to read it a second time in the light of the events in the last volume, particularly the account of the meal at which characters from the previous eleven volumes reappear. The second reading is an entirely different experience, knowing what would happen later to each of the characters. And yes, I have.

Karl Sabbagh

Bloxham, Oxfordshire

• Re Dead casual: why corpses are dressing down (25 September), having just buried the second of my parents, I wrestled with this dilemma; do you put underwear on a corpse? I sent Dad off wearing pants but Mum went commando. What is the etiquette for underclothing on the dead?

Andrew Vincent

Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

• Like Michele Hanson (26 September), I too have a large collection of ancient hand-embroidered tablecloths made by my mother, granny and aunties. But I have a plan. This winter I shall cut the best bits of the embroidery into squares, appliqué them on to a large tasteful piece of coffee-coloured fabric and give the resulting tablecloth to my daughter. In the fullness of time she can write to you to say what she plans to do with it.

Jane Lawson

London

• Also common at meetings are the shoveler, in a hole but still digging, and the gannet and sandwich tern, arriving just in time for the working lunch (Letters, passim).

Mary Bowden

Harrow, Middlesex

• As Raymond Chandler wrote, “when I split an infinitive, god damn it, I split it so it stays split” (G2, 26 September).

Ken Ducker

Yorkley, Gloucestershire

• To the credit of German voters, the percentage embracing the far right is only a third of those opting for rightwing extremism in America.

Shanti Chakravarty

Bangor, Gwynedd

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