AS an iconic figure, Alasdair Gray’s death will be mourned by the nation ("Author, artist, visionary, genius", The Herald, December 30), but on a much more intimate level he will be deeply mourned by two women at least, myself and his neighbour and devoted friend of 40 years, May Hooper.

As for myself, my sense of loss is much more selfish than May’s. After having read and loved most of Alasdair’s books – Poor Things and The Rise of Kelvin Walker are among my favourites – I approached Alasdair 15 years ago asking for a sitting to which he warmly agreed. The first time he opened his door to me he cracked a joke – we both laughed heartily – and from that moment I was entirely at ease with him. Alasdair was what we in Scotland call a case – full of fun, chat, fiercely political, always on the side of the oppressed. Being the generous and democratically-minded soul that he was he suggested to me – a virtually unknown artist – that we exhibit together. Since then we have shared four successful exhibitions and we had two lined up for this year, at the Hidden Lane Gallery in Glasgow and the Resipole Gallery near Strontian.

May Hooper’s loss is of a different order . To quote George Eliot “... the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts...” (Middlemarch) , and May’s devotion to Alasdair has been as profound as it has been unsung. For many years she modelled for him – those familiar with Alasdair’s art will know the dark-haired beauty who featured so often in his work – and in later years , first towards Alasdair and Morag, and latterly towards Alasdair himself she has been a devoted friend and carer (she is nurse-trained), constantly by his side in his hours of need, there for every emergency, caring for him, laughing with him, and finally by his sick bed in his last hours.

Alasdair was a polymath, his legacy to Scotland as an artist and writer is unprecedented, and many well-known literary and artistic figures are paying tribute to his genius, which is as it should be; but how many remember those unheroic figures who give unstintingly.

Alasdair did. He was a man of the people, generous, unassuming, and deeply concerned about social justice. It is no accident that he and May were firm friends to the last.

Joyce Gunn Cairns MBE, Edinburgh EH4.

IN 2005 I left university with no clear plans and was mooching around the Mitchell Library one day when I got an email from Alan Riach, then head of the Scottish literature department. Alasdair Gray needed a new secretary – £15 an hour and was I interested?

I was, and spent the next five years in Alasdair’s large, bright Marchmont Terrace sitting-room, surrounded by books, proofs, curios, paintbrushes arranged like bunches of flowers along the windowsill, and a host of paintings. A current painting or commission might sit on the old, heavy wooden easel in the far corner or lie flat on Alasdair’s angled school desktop, but portraits sat along the top of the high wall-to-wall bookshelves, watching down as we worked. Some of these were decades old and the friends long gone, but Alasdair would see an improvement to be made,the painting brought down and the background colour painted over in layers, until, satisfied for now, he would move on to something else.

The secretary’s chair (as I will call it) had been recently vacated by Rodge, who had plans to write a biography of Alasdair. It had (by the time I knew it) a dark green velour covering and deep wingback sides which ended in carved wooden flourishes at arms and feet. Old metal springs coiled in the seat and as the morning wore on, I would shift around to find a comfortable position. In winter I would bring in thick socks and a hot water bottle, and the chair felt like an enclosure against the dark, cold days before Alasdair and Morag qualified for a government scheme to have central heating installed.

Each morning, I would let myself in and make a cup of coffee while Alasdair ate his porridge and prunes. If Morag was awake in bed I would have a chat with her, and then we would settle down to work. Alasdair wrote in large, hardback ledgers, some of which (as I remember) he had rescued from a skip in the 1970s, and would dictate passages of Old Men in Love, Fleck or Midgieburgers while I typed into a laptop beside him.

Later, for A Life in Pictures we worked directly on to a computer screen which helped him to look at page layouts sent by Sharon the typesetter. With the use of dummy text we would carefully calculate the number of words which could be used around each picture, and Alasdair would start to dictate, "errr, ahem, rrrright", a firm forefinger pointed at the screen. Others who have worked with Alasdair will know of his exacting, often infuriating pattern of editing and re-editing, until, just before you despair, only the bare essential words are left, honed into a perfect arrangement.

As Alasdair brooded on the next sentence, or how to improve the last, I would sit in the chair and daydream, look at the portraits high on the wall or through the window to the sunlight on the trees surrounding Horselethill House, and absentmindedly wonder where all the women writers were on the bookshelves. Later, we would walk down Observatory Road to Antipasti on Byres Road, and share the same lunch each day – minestrone soup with chunky vegetables and parmesan cheese, and what Alasdair called "garrrrlic toast".

Eventually I moved on to a more secure, less interesting job in a university office, but I knew then and now what a privilege it was to sit beside Alasdair in the big green chair with its ageing springs, and watch how books are written.

Helen Lloyd, Glasgow G20.