John Reade was born on November 13, 1837, in Ballyshannon, Ireland.

He was a journalist, essayist, and poet. He immigrated to Canada with his parents in 1856, settling in Montreal, Quebec. In 1857, he founded Montreal Literary Magazine and became its editor. In 1859, he became a rector of Lachute Academy and began studying theology. He was ordained an Anglican minister in 1865 and served in two parishes (Mascouche and Mansonville) before leaving the ministry in 1867 due to ill health. Returning to Montreal in 1868, Reade began writing for the Montreal Gazette. In 1870, he became the Gazette's literary editor, a position he held until his death in 1919. He conducted a column entitled "Old and New", under the initials "R. V." In 1870, he published a volume of verse, “The Prophecy of Merlin, and Other Poems”. He contributed numerous papers on a variety of subjects to virtually all the major Canadian literary periodicals. Reade was a founding Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in 1882. He was a member and served as president of both the Society of Canadian Literature and the Society for Historical Studies. He was also a member of the Société littéraire et historique de Québec. In 1896, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature of Great Britain. In 1906, he received an honorary degree of LL.D. from the University of Ottawa.

He died unmarried, on March 26, 1919, in Montreal, Quebec.