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TNS-Sofres/SNCF–Lire, 101 Books

Published in the October 2004 issue of Lire magazine, the list popularly known as “The 100 Favourite Books of the French” was in fact the result of a nationwide postal survey titled “Les livres fondateurs des Français.” Polling institute TNS-Sofres designed the study for the railway company SNCF as the flagship event of its travelling literacy campaign “En train de lire,” held during the book festival Lire en fête. Between 16 June and 26 July 2004, a representative panel of 10,000 French residents aged 15 + was screened to keep the 3,800 who had bought at least one book in the previous year; they were asked to list up to three books that had “marked [them] for life.” 2,121 usable questionnaires came back—about 57 %—and the 100 most-cited titles formed the final ranking, offering a portrait of readers’ lifelong favourites rather than an expert literary canon.

This list was originally published in 2004 and was added to this site almost 2 years ago.