When I was a graduate student in the English Department at Stanford, Ian Watt was the chairman and he directed my dissertation on Joseph Conrad and he was an academic genius. He sometimes preferred books to people although he had a terrific sense of humor, and he once told me, “I’ve had thousands of great experiences with books.”

I know what he meant.

I sometimes fall in love with a book.

In love.

Not long ago, I picked up “The Go-Between” by L.P. Hartley at a Sebastopol used bookstore and I just finished it, and I’m in love. Joseph Losey made a movie of it decades ago — with a screenplay by Harold Pinter — very good movie; better book.

I’ve had a glow all day because I didn’t think there would be any new book I could fall in love with.

Here are some books I love:

Lolita

A River Runs Through It

Lord Jim

The Good Soldier

Huckleberry Finn

The Sweet Science

The Adventures of Augie March

The Collected Short Stories of Saul Bellow

The Great Gatsby

Miss Lonelyhearts

The Assistant

The Fixer

The Natural

Dubliners

Brighton Rock

All of Jane Austen

David Copperfield

Great Expectations

The Spoils of Poynton

The Portrait of a Lady

In Cold Blood

….. I could go on.