The 500 best books of all time from Culture Café users

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

About this list

Culture Café, 498 Books

In October 2008, the Culture Café site asked Internet users to vote for their ten favorite books. After collecting 5,000 votes and listing more than 3,000 titles, here are the results of the 500 best chosen by Internet users of the site

Details on the method and classification

- A list of ten books was requested from Internet users, in order of preference of their favorite works (all genres, nationalities, and dates of publication). The votes were anonymous.
- Only the rankings containing the ten titles were counted. The votes containing fewer were automatically deleted by the software.
- The book arriving first in each ranking was awarded ten points, the second nine points, etc.
- The series of novels (Harry Potter, Dune, etc.) have been counted under the generic name of the complete series"

This list was originally published in 2008 and was added to this site over 2 years ago.

View: List Grid Table
Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
361 Foundation Isaac Asimov 1951 American English
279 The Secret History Donna Tartt 1992 American English
326 The Unnamable Samuel Beckett 1953 Irish French
45 Fictions Jorge Luis Borges 1944 Argentinian Spanish
230 The Call of the Wild Jack London 1903 American English
74 The Scarlet Letter Nathaniel Hawthorne 1850 American English
297 Ivanhoe Sir Walter Scott 1819 British English
55 Animal Farm George Orwell 1945 British English
7157 La Horde Du Contrevent Alain Damasio 2004 French French
2609 The Gambler Fyodor Dostoevsky 1866 Russian Russian
12311 When I Was Five I Killed Myself Howard Buten 1981 American English
1086 Misery Stephen King 1987 American English
150 Fahrenheit 451 Ray Bradbury 1953 American English
366 The Hunchback of Notre-Dame Victor Hugo 1831 French French
1042 Franny and Zooey J. D. Salinger 1961 American English
1747 Twenty Four Hours In The Life Of A Woman Stefan Zweig 1927 Austrian German
1455 Antigone Jean Anouilh 1944 French French
126 If This Is a Man Primo Levi 1947 Italian Italian
166 Love in the Time of Cholera Gabriel García Márquez 1985 Colombian Spanish
97 For Whom the Bell Tolls Ernest Hemingway 1940 American English
63 Under the Volcano Malcolm Lowry 1947 British English
296 The Lover Marguerite Duras 1984 French French
30 The Divine Comedy Dante Alighieri 1308 Italian Italian
2471 Hyperion Dan Simmons 1989 American English
2155 Don Juan Molière 1665 French French
2962 Au Bonheur Des Dames Émile Zola 1883 French French
14433 Fault Lines Nancy Huston 2006 French French
657 The Elementary Particles Michel Houellebecq 1998 French French
10193 City of Glass Paul Auster 1985 American English
2886 Everything Is Illuminated Jonathan Safran Foer 2002 American English
14088 La Part De L'autre Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt 2001 French French
2650 The House of Scorta Laurent Gaudé 2004 French French
131 King Lear William Shakespeare 1608 British English
46 One Thousand and One Nights Unknown 800 Multiple Arabic
1217 Foucault's Pendulum Umberto Eco 1988 Italian Italian
186 Bonjour Tristesse Francoise Sagan 1954 French French
13225 My Stupid Dog John Fante 1986 American English
2159 The Clan of the Cave Bear Jean M. Auel 1980 American English
218 The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Robert Louis Stevenson 1886 British English
412 Jacques the Fatalist and His Master Denis Diderot 1796 French French
116 A Sentimental Education Gustave Flaubert 1869 French French
491 Bouvard et Pécuchet Gustave Flaubert 1881 French French
13751 The Dead Heart Douglas Kennedy 1994 American English
1436 Letters to a Young Poet Rainer Maria Rilke 1929 Austrian German
11064 The Red Grass Boris Vian 1949 French French
80 Candide Voltaire 1759 French French
2509 The Abyss Marguerite Yourcenar 1968 French French
1161 Norwegian Wood Haruki Murakami 1987 Japanese Japanese
4389 Novecento Alessandro Baricco 1994 Italian Italian
1470 Wind, Sand and Stars Antoine de Saint-Exupéry 1939 French French
318 If on a Winter's Night a Traveller Italo Calvino 1979 Italian Italian
172 Man's Fate Andre Malraux 1933 French French
8690 Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close Jonathan Safran Foer 2005 American English
1201 Kafka On The Shore Haruki Murakami 2002 Japanese Japanese
222 Thus Spake Zarathustra Friedrich Nietzsche 1883 German German
439 North and South Elizabeth Gaskell 1855 British English
14323 Grey Souls Philippe Claudel 2003 French French
75 Essays Michel de Montaigne 1580 French French
9708 Address Unknown Kathrine Kressmann Taylor 1938 American English
66 The Metamorphosis Franz Kafka 1915 Czech German
711 Flowers for Algernon Daniel Keyes 1959 American English
794 The Royal Game Stefan Zweig 1941 Austrian German
117 Tess of the d'Urbervilles Thomas Hardy 1891 British English
12029 Night Train To Lisbon Pascal Mercier 2004 Swiss German
12066 Les Thanatonautes Bernard Werber 1994 French French
1310 Cyrano de Bergerac Edmond Rostand 1897 French French
274 The Stand Stephen King 1978 American English
478 Alcools Guillaume Apollinaire 1913 French French
524 A Prayer for Owen Meany John Irving 1989 American English
1471 Aurélien Louis Aragon 1944 French French
334 Infinite Jest David Foster Wallace 1996 American English
538 Zazie in the Metro Raymond Queneau 1959 French French
11442 Il Colombre Dino Buzzati 1966 Italian Italian
13803 Les Racines Du Mal Maurice G. Dantec 1995 French French
140 The Second Sex Simone de Beauvoir 1949 French French
200 The Book of Disquiet Fernando Pessoa 1982 Portuguese Portuguese
1123 The Symposium Plato -385 Greek Ancient greek
3322 Confusion Stefan Zweig 1927 Austrian German
3584 The Would-Be Gentleman Molière 1670 French French
6276 American Tabloid James Ellroy 1995 American English
984 Tartuffe Molière 1664 French French
148 One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn 1962 Russian Russian
282 The Sorrows of Young Werther Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1774 German German
11140 Ravage René Barjavel 1943 French French
463 The Songs of Maldoror Comte de Lautréamont 1868 French French
12419 Desert J. M. G. Le Clezio 1980 French French
1466 Don Juan Lord Byron 1819 British English
14055 City Alessandro Baricco 1999 Italian Italian
1212 A General Introduction to Psycho-Analysis Sigmund Freud 1920 Austrian German
1918 The Lady Of The Camellias Alexandre Dumas 1848 French French
2903 What I Loved Siri Hustvedt 2003 American English
501 W, or the Memory of Childhood Georges Perec 1975 French French
2387 Viper’s Tangle François Mauriac 1932 French French
245 Nausea Jean Paul Sartre 1938 French French
6171 I Spit On Your Graves Boris Vian 1946 French French
1142 Life of Pi Yann Martel 2001 Canadian English
104 Dead Souls Nikolai Gogol 1842 Russian Russian
11177 Philosophy In The Boudoir Marquis de Sade 1795 French French
4175 Replay Ken Grimwood 1986 American English
9783 Autumn In Peking Boris Vian 1947 French French
163 Siddhartha Hermann Hesse 1922 German German
541 The Seven Pillars of Wisdom T. E. Lawrence 1926 British English
56 The Leopard Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa 1958 Italian Italian
835 The Art of War Sun Tzu -500 Chinese Classical chinese
7783 The Gunslinger Stephen King 1982 American English
3304 The Silmarillion J. R. R. Tolkien 1977 British English
8260 Christine Stephen King 1983 American English
37 The Iliad Homer -750 Greek Ancient greek
1626 The Colour of Magic Terry Pratchett 1983 British English
568 The Mandarins Simone de Beauvoir 1954 French French
252 The Waves Virginia Woolf 1931 British English
2065 The Egghead Republic Arno Schmidt 1957 German German
1594 The Imaginary Invalid Molière 1673 French French
86 All Quiet on the Western Front Erich Maria Remarque 1928 German German
583 Against Nature J. K. Huysmans 1884 French French
14383 Simple Marie-Aude Murail 2004 French French
441 The Crying of Lot 49 Thomas Pynchon 1966 American English
2224 Good Omens Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman 1990 British English
751 All the Pretty Horses Cormac McCarthy 1992 American English
32 Mrs. Dalloway Virginia Woolf 1925 British English