Indiana, with his Fables. Forty yearsnago I founded the George Ade Societynof East Lansing, Michigan. Here is mynfavorite line from Ade: “It is hard to benblase in a town that calls it blaze.”n(Indeed, I borrowed that sentence toninsert in my African novel A Creaturenof the Twilight.) It is heartening to findnAde still beloved at Dartmouth, wherenDr. Perrin adorns the department ofnEnglish.nWe pass by Stendahl, GwennRaverat, and Henry King (not that Indisdain them) to arrive at ErnestnThompson Seton’s Wild Animals InHave Known, a prime favorite of mynyouth. I liked still better, though,nThompson Seton’s Two Little Savages,nrecently reprinted — which Intried in vain to read to my daughters;ndistinctly it is a boy’s book. Don’t missntherein the battle between the skunknand the mother cat.nFrom Seton’s wildernesses we tumblenmost abruptly into the London ofnthat high-minded Gockney namednCharles Williams: for Perrin, like thisnwriter, takes All Hallows’ Eve for thenbest and scariest of Williams’ romances.nAlong with Walter de la Maren(appreciated later in this Reader’s Delight),nWilliams much influenced mynown tales of the mystical and thenuncanny, in my collections The Princessnof All Lands and Watchers at thenStrait Gate.nWe cannot touch here upon all ofnPerrin’s selections, which are widerangingnin the realm of letters. I comenupon old friends, often unexpectedly,nin many of his chapters. Why, here’snHenry Adams, who was accorded anchapter in my book The ConservativenMind. Perrin praises Adams’ realisticnnovel Democracy, as I do. He evennmentions Baron Jacobi, a character innDemocracy, whom I am forever quotingnon the persistence of political corruptionnin this republic.nErnest Bramah, Joseph Mitchell,nW.N.P. Barbellion, Bryher, LordnDunsany, Eric Newby — how thosennames conjure up for my mind’s eyendays or nights when I read those mennof letters in a Scottish country house,nor in Palermo, or in Rabat, or at myngreat-grandfather’s house in the backncountry of Michigan! Dr. Perrin and Indiffer substantially, nevertheless, on thenmerits of recent novelists; I wouldnname as my favorites only one or twonof his selection (classics aside, ofncourse).nBut we concur in praise of RosenMacaulay, whose A Casual Commentarynis named by Perrin; I would havenselected her travels in antique lands,nPleasure of Ruins, or her novel ThenTowers of Trebizond (which last isnmentioned by Perrin, too).nThe only directly polemical or didacticnbook among Perrin’s 40 is C.S.nLewis’ They Asked for a Paper; andnthat (one of Lewis’ lesser-known collections)nargumentative only in part. “Indare to recommend Lewis in his scholarlynrole to the general reader,” Perrinnwrites, “because he is that rarity amongngreat scholars, a person with a clear andnextremely readable prose style. . . .nLewis is amazing in his ability tonexpress the full complexity of a thing innlanguage as clear and ringing as crystal.”nWell put!nA Reader’s Delight, as Perrin impliesnabove, is intended for the GeneralnReader or Gommon Reader: the sortnof tolerably educated, intellectuallynquick person whom I have had in mindnwhen writing my own books. ArenCommon Readers a dying breed nowadays?nTV, video, and all such gadgetsnharass or seduce the Gommon Readernday in and day out. Books are priced sonhigh that only the better public orninstitutional libraries can afford to purchasenmany of them; and the morenbook prices rise, the fewer purchasersnmay be found; thus the process becomesncumulative, price per book beingnincreased to compensate for diminishingnsales.nA dozen of the books commendednby Dr. Perrin are out of print, thoughnall but two of these may be obtained onninterlibrary loan. Those two, he informsnus, were published in Londonnbut not in the United States. Perrinnmentions that his newspaper articlesnabout out-of-print books have thricenpersuaded publishers to bring out newnprintings or editions. A published lecturenby this reviewer recently producednsimilar results. More Common Readersnmay survive than publishers surmise.nAs the number of decentnoldfangled bookshops continues to diminish,nmore and more CommonnReaders must be reached by publishers’ncatalogs sent through the mails.nNot one of us Gommon Readers,nprobably, if required to name andnnndescribe 40 favorite nonclassic booksnafter the fashion of A Reader’s Delight,nwould draw up precisely Dr.nPerrin’s catalog — although it is doubtfulnif any informed Common Readernwould be inclined to reject every booknon the Perrin roster. Every man to hisnhumor, in the republic of letters. Ournprivate tastes are formed in part bynwhat books we may have found to handnin youth, or what we have read atnhappy or solemn moments later in life,nor by other personal circumstances.nAs T.S. Eliot reasoned, it is notnimportant what books we read, as thatnwe should all read the same books. Butnhe was referring in this passage to thengreat books upon which our literarynculture is founded: the Greek andnRoman classics, Dante, Shakespeare,nSamuel Johnson, a few others. Everynnominally educated man or womannshould have been introduced to thosenwriters, that there may be formed ancommon ground of thought and imagination;notherwise, intellectual and spiritualndisorder and gross misunderstandingnprevail.nIt is not with such indispensablenbooks that Dr. Perrin is concerned in AnReader’s Delight, however; he leavesnus free to name those books that havenmoved us greatly, whether or not theynmay be classified as immortal prose ornpoetry. When asked once what linesnhad most affected him. Sir OsbertnSitwell truthfully replied, “Froggienwould a-wooing go,/ Whether hisnmother would let him or no.” (Thatnimpending doom!) In most of us, certainnbooks have touched a nerve, overnthe years; and often we feel impelled tonpersuade friends or students to take upnthose particular volumes, that they toonmay be moved for the better, or findnconsolation, or have imaginationnroused, or merely be tickled by wit.nMy own library is lodged in a biggishnbrick building that once was a factory: angood place to read and write in thensmall hours. Some people think I haven10,000 volumes; I never have countednthem; anyway, they are all good books,nfor I weed the shelves annually. Perrinnwould like the place. Might I select 40nof my books after the Perrin fashion:nnot the great famous books, but delightfulnones—books worthy of beingncarried into eternity by one’s soul,nsupposing that a bookish man mightnpass through the eye of a needle morenOCTOBER 1988127n