About this list

Central and East European Publishing Project, 100 Books

In 1986, a diverse group of writers and scholars came together to try to assist independent East European writers and publishers both at home and in exile. The Chairman was Lord Dahrendorf, Warden of St.Antony's College, Oxford. Other members were the French historian Francois Furet; Raymond Georis, Director of the European Cultural Foundation, Amsterdam; Laurens van Krevelen of the Dutch publishing house Meulenhoff; the Swedish writer Per Wastberg, at the time President of International PEN; the European correspondent of the New Yorker, Jane Kramer; and the historian and commentator Timothy Garton Ash. It was
envisaged that support would take two forms: first, to ensure publication in the original languages, and second, to encourage more translations.

One of the basic tenets of this initiative, which came to be known as the Central and East European Publishing Project (CEEPP), was that the geopolitical division of Europe - the Iron Curtain was then still very much a reality - had interrupted the normal and healthy flow not just of people but also of books and ideas. Its aim, in the words of Ralf Dahrendorf, was to foster a "common market of the mind" throughout the whole of Europe. After 1989, CEEPP was able to expand its activities and organize workshops and in-house training for those involved in publishing, but its main concern remained to facilitate the publication of worthwhile books and journals.

At Trustees' meetings, titles submitted by publishers for consideration were scrutinized for their quality and relevance. Not surprisingly, there were, among the Orwells, Poppers, and Hannah Arendts, some very odd works, and also some strange omissions. Inspired and provoked by the perusal of these lists over the years, the Trustees decided that in their final year of activity (the Project disbanded at the end of 1994) they would respond to the challenge of producing, as a jeu d'esprit, a consciously arbitrary list of the 100 books which have been most influential in the West since 1945.

An initial list was put together by a small panel consisting of Robert Cassen, Dahrendorf, Garton Ash, Michael Ignatieff, Leszek Kolakowski, and Bryan Magee. It was then revised, following an extensive discussion at the last meeting of CEEPP Trustees. Works of fiction were included only when they had a wider impact.

Who voted?
The first shortlist of titles was drawn up in 1994 by a six-person working group (Robert Cassen, Ralf Dahrendorf, Timothy Garton Ash, Michael Ignatieff, Leszek Kołakowski, Bryan Magee). Their draft was then debated and amended by the full board of the Central and East European Publishing Project. That board now numbered 11 trustees, so the final “Hundred Most Influential Books Since the War” reflects the collective judgment of roughly a dozen leading European historians, philosophers, writers and publishers.

This list was originally published in 1995 and was added to this site over 2 years ago.