1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die

This is one of the 759 lists we use to generate our main The Greatest Books list.

About this list

The Book, 1001 Books

A book edited by Peter Boxall, and written by over 100 hundred international critics.

This list was originally published in 2006 and was added to this site about 7 years ago.

View: List Grid Table
Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
442 The Magus John Fowles 1965 British English
34 The Master and Margarita Mikhail Bulgakov 1967 Russian Russian
158 Wide Sargasso Sea Jean Rhys 1966 British English
494 The Third Policeman Flann O'Brien 1967 Irish English
2493 Miramar Naguib Mahfouz 1967 Egyptian Arabic
1849 Z Vassilis Vassilikos 1967 Greek Greek
2540 Pilgrimage Dorothy Richardson 1915 British English
4082 The Manor Isaac Bashevis Singer 1967 Polish Yiddish
5 One Hundred Years of Solitude Gabriel García Márquez 1967 Colombian Spanish
4082 No Laughing Matter Angus Wilson 1967 British English
4082 The Day of the Dolphin Robert Merle 1967 French French
540 The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test Tom Wolfe 1968 American English
2948 Eva Trout Elizabeth Bowen 1968 Irish English
4133 The Cathedral Oles Honchar 1968 Ukrainian Ukrainian
792 A Kestrel for a Knave Barry Hines 1968 British English
1633 In Watermelon Sugar Richard Brautigan 1968 American English
1040 The German Lesson Siegfried Lenz 1968 German German
2204 The Quest for Christa T. Christa Wolf 1968 German German
528 Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Philip K. Dick 1968 American English
1004 2001 Arthur C. Clarke 1968 British English
504 Her Lover Albert Cohen 1968 Swiss French
1522 Cancer Ward Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn 1967 Russian Russian
1530 Myra Breckinridge Gore Vidal 1968 American English
1749 First Circle Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn 1968 Russian Russian
936 A Void Georges Perec 1969 French French
685 Them Joyce Carol Oates 1969 American English
360 Ada or Ardor Vladimir Nabokov 1969 American English
242 The Godfather Mario Puzo 1969 American English
241 Portnoy's Complaint Philip Roth 1969 American English
1237 Jacob the Liar Jurek Becker 1969 German German
567 The French Lieutenant's Woman John Fowles 1969 British English
84 Slaughterhouse-Five Kurt Vonnegut 1969 American English
2983 Blind Man with a Pistol Chester Himes 1969 American English
2266 Pricksongs and Descants Robert Coover 1969 American English
2982 Tent of Miracles Jorge Amado 1969 Brazilian Portuguese
4206 The Case Worker György Konrád 1969 Hungarian Hungarian
744 Moscow to the End of the Line Venedikt Yerofeev 1970 Russian Russian
4206 Heartbreak Tango Manuel Puig 1969 Argentinian Spanish
516 Season of Migration to the North Al-Tayyib Salih 1966 Sudanese Arabic
4206 Here's to You, Jesusa! Elena Poniatowska 1969 Mexican Spanish
1571 Fifth Business Robertson Davies 1970 Canadian English
433 Play It As It Lays Joan Didion 1970 American English
577 Anniversaries Uwe Johnson 1970 German German
3049 A World for Julius Alfredo Bryce Echenique 1970 Peruvian Spanish
521 I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings Maya Angelou 1969 American English
308 The Bluest Eye Toni Morrison 1970 American English
1375 The Sea of Fertility Yukio Mishima 1965 Japanese Japanese
668 Rabbit Redux John Updike 1971 American English
4828 Cataract Mykhaylo Osadchy 1976 Ukrainian Ukrainian
1916 Group Portrait with Lady Heinrich Böll 1971 German German
683 Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas Hunter S. Thompson 1971 American English
838 The Book of Daniel E. L. Doctorow 1971 American English
933 Lives of Girls and Women Alice Munro 1971 Canadian English
4434 House Mother Normal B. S. Johnson 1971 British English
2184 In a Free State V. S. Naipaul 1971 Trinidadian English
2174 Surfacing Margaret Atwood 1972 Canadian English
1564 G. John Berger 1972 British English
1263 The Summer Book Tove Jansson 1972 Finnish Swedish
2238 The Twilight Years Sawako Ariyoshi 1972 Japanese Japanese
1313 The Optimist's Daughter Eudora Welty 1972 American English
202 Invisible Cities Italo Calvino 1972 Italian Italian
254 Gravity's Rainbow Thomas Pynchon 1973 American English
3156 The Honorary Consul Graham Greene 1973 British English
841 Crash J. G. Ballard 1973 British English
4206 The Castle of Crossed Destinies Italo Calvino 1969 Italian Italian
663 The Siege of Krishnapur J. G. Farrell 1973 British English
1321 A Question of Power Bessie Head 1973 Botswanan English
827 Fear of Flying Erica Jong 1973 American English
553 The Dispossessed Ursula K. Le Guin 1974 American English
1904 The Diviners Margaret Laurence 1974 Canadian English
920 The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum Heinrich Böll 1974 German German
4662 Dusklands J. M. Coetzee 1974 South African English
4662 The Fan Man William Kotzwinkle 1974 American English
4206 Luka Antun Šoljan 1969 Croatian Croatian
406 Ragtime E. L. Doctorow 1975 American English
4741 The Commandant Jessica Anderson 1975 Australian English
3216 The Year of the Hare Arto Paasilinna 1975 Finnish Finnish
666 Humboldt's Gift Saul Bellow 1975 American English
1234 Woman at Point Zero Nawal El Saadawi 1975 Egyptian Arabic
4741 Willard and His Bowling Trophies Richard Brautigan 1975 American English
477 Fateless or Fatelessness Imre Kertész 1975 Hungarian Hungarian
2308 The Dead Father Donald Barthelme 1975 American English
2256 Correction Thomas Bernhard 1975 Austrian German
325 A Dance to the Music of Time Anthony Powell 1951 British English
501 W, or the Memory of Childhood Georges Perec 1975 French French
1635 The Autumn of the Patriarch Gabriel García Márquez 1975 Colombian Spanish
4828 Patterns of Childhood Christa Wolf 1976 German German
4828 Blaming Elizabeth Taylor 1976 British English
4828 Cutter and Bone Newton Thornburg 1976 American English
661 Interview with the Vampire Anne Rice 1976 American English
2313 The Left-Handed Woman Peter Handke 1976 Austrian German
1335 Kiss of the Spider Woman Manuel Puig 1976 Argentinian Spanish
2599 Almost Transparent Blue Ryū Murakami 1976 Japanese Japanese
4939 In the Heart of the Country J. M. Coetzee 1977 South African English
1824 The Engineer of Human Souls Josef Škvorecký 1977 Czech Czech
2027 Quartet in Autumn Barbara Pym 1977 British English
882 The Hour of the Star Clarice Lispector 1977 Brazilian Portuguese
260 Song of Solomon Toni Morrison 1977 American English
2603 The Wars Timothy Findley 1977 Canadian English
652 Dispatches Michael Herr 1977 American English
400 The Shining Stephen King 1977 American English
1731 Delta of Venus Anaïs Nin 1977 French English
1766 Who Do You Think You Are? Alice Munro 1978 Canadian English
1729 Requiem for a Dream Hubert Selby 1978 American English
5016 The Singapore Grip J. G. Farrell 1978 British English
454 The Sea, The Sea Iris Murdoch 1978 British English
276 Life, a User's Manual Georges Perec 1978 French French
3423 The Back Room Carmen Martín Gaite 1978 Spanish Spanish
2269 The Virgin in the Garden A. S. Byatt 1978 British English
1578 The Cement Garden Ian McEwan 1978 British English
190 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Douglas Adams 1979 British English
318 If on a Winter's Night a Traveller Italo Calvino 1979 Italian Italian
1278 So Long a Letter Mariama Bâ 1980 Senegalese French
938 Burger's Daughter Nadine Gordimer 1979 South African English
732 A Bend in the River V. S. Naipaul 1979 Trinidadian English
1003 A Dry White Season Andre Brink 1979 South African Afrikaans
1093 The Book of Laughter and Forgetting Milan Kundera 1979 Czech Czech
2152 Fool's Gold Máro Doýka 1979 Hungarian Unknown
5144 Southern Seas Manuel Vázquez Montalbán 1979 Spanish Spanish
114 The Name of the Rose Umberto Eco 1980 Italian Italian