The Modern Library: The Two Hundred Best Novels in English Since 1950

This is one of the 743 lists we use to generate our main The Greatest Books list.

About this list

The Modern Library (Book), 209 Books

The authors have chosen the 200 books since 1950 that they consider to be the best. It includes some familiar names and some surprises. Witty and controversial, their aim is to encourage reading.

The Authors
- Dame Carmen Thérèse Callil, DBE, FRSL was an Australian publisher, writer and critic who spent most of her career in the United Kingdom. She founded Virago Press in 1973 and received the Benson Medal from the Royal Society of Literature in 2017
- Colm Tóibín FRSL is an Irish novelist, short story writer, essayist, journalist, critic, playwright and poet. His first novel, The South, was published in 1990. The Blackwater Lightship was shortlisted for the Booker Prize.

This list was originally published in 2011 and was added to this site over 2 years ago.

View: List Grid Table
Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
330 Housekeeping Marilynne Robinson 1980 American English
203 A Confederacy of Dunces John Kennedy Toole 1980 American English
17008 Puffball Fay Weldon 1980 British English
1165 Lanark Alasdair Gray 1981 Scottish English
1000 Red Dragon Thomas Harris 1981 American English
64 Midnight's Children Salman Rushdie 1981 Indian English
1960 A Flag For Sunrise Robert Stone 1981 American English
2507 On the Black Hill Bruce Chatwin 1982 British English
1025 Schindler's List Thomas Keneally 1982 Australian English
159 The Color Purple Alice Walker 1982 American English
1065 A Boy's Own Story Edmund White 1982 American English
749 Money Martin Amis 1984 British English
1567 Empire of the Sun J. G. Ballard 1984 British English
987 Flaubert's Parrot Julian Barnes 1984 British English
14165 In Custody Anita Desai 1984 Indian English
14901 The Children's Bach Helen Garner 1984 Australian English
17008 Nation Of Fools Balraj Khanna 1984 Indian English
2296 Machine Dreams Jayne Anne Phillips 1984 American English
17008 Family And Friends Anita Brookner 1985 British English
198 Blood Meridian Cormac McCarthy 1985 American English
631 Lonesome Dove Larry McMurtry 1985 American English
17008 Black Robe Brian Moore 1985 Canadian English
1461 Oranges are not the only Fruit Jeanette Winterson 1985 British English
1635 The Sportswriter Richard Ford 1986 American English
3062 An Artist of the Floating World Kazuo Ishiguro 1986 British English
2340 A Summons to Memphis Peter Taylor 1986 American English
1887 A Dark Adapted Eye Barbara Vine 1986 British English
4441 Ellen Foster Kaye Gibbons 1987 American English
14901 Double Whammy Carl Hiaasen 1987 American English
1084 Misery Stephen King 1987 American English
49 Beloved Toni Morrison 1987 American English
4280 In The Skin Of A Lion Michael Ondaatje 1987 Canadian English
17008 The Other Garden Francis Wyndham 1987 British English
1559 Oscar and Lucinda Peter Carey 1988 Australian English
923 Where I'm Calling From Raymond Carver 1988 American English
3161 Paris Trout Pete Dexter 1988 American English
17008 The Sugar Mother Elizabeth Jolley 1988 Australian English
17008 Forty Seventeen Frank Moorhouse 1988 Australian English
5299 Ice-Candy-Man Bapsi Sidhwa 1988 Pakistani English
2380 Breathing Lessons Anne Tyler 1988 American English
309 Bonfire of the Vanities Tom Wolfe 1987 American English
12120 The Book Of Evidence John Banville 1989 Irish English
2388 The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love Oscar Hijuelos 1989 American English
737 The Joy Luck Club Amy Tan 1989 American English
731 Possession A. S. Byatt 1990 British English
14901 Age Of Iron J. M. Coetzee 1990 South African English
14901 A Home at the End of the World Michael Cunningham 1990 American English
17008 The Snapper Roddy Doyle 1990 Irish English
1109 Get Shorty Elmore Leonard 1990 American English
17008 The Great World David Malouf 1990 Australian English
1408 Amongst Women John McGahern 1990 Irish English
10973 Friend Of My Youth Alice Munro 1990 Canadian English
848 Regeneration Pat Barker 1991 British English
2693 Wise Children Angela Carter 1991 British English
14901 A Strange And Sublime Address Amit Chaudhuri 1991 Indian English
569 American Psycho Bret Easton Ellis 1991 American English
17008 The Redundancy Of Courage Timothy Mo 1991 British English
1198 Mating Norman Rush 1991 American English
14901 Downriver Iain Sinclair 1991 British English
999 A Thousand Acres Jane Smiley 1991 American English
17008 Reading Turgenev William Trevor 1991 Irish English
3822 Cloudstreet Tim Winton 1991 Australian English
13215 Death And Nightingales Eugene McCabe 1992 Irish English
2350 The Butcher Boy Patrick McCabe 1992 Irish English
278 The Secret History Donna Tartt 1992 American English
1967 The Virgin Suicides Jeffrey Eugenides 1993 American English
1083 Birdsong Sebastian Faulks 1993 British English
10146 A River Sutra Gita Mehta 1993 Indian English
488 The Shipping News Annie Proulx 1993 Canadian English
17008 My Idea Of Fun Will Self 1993 British English
748 A Suitable Boy Vikram Seth 1993 Indian English
2196 Trainspotting Irvine Welsh 1993 Scottish English
2319 What a Carve Up! Jonathan Coe 1994 British English
1932 Corelli's Mandolin Louis de Bernières 1994 British English
14901 The Folding Star Alan Hollinghurst 1994 British English
17008 Original Sin P. D. James 1994 British English
2062 How Late It Was, How Late James Kelman 1994 Scottish English
6548 The Tortilla Curtain T. Coraghessan Boyle 1995 American English
1097 The Blue Flower Penelope Fitzgerald 1995 British English
557 A Fine Balance Rohinton Mistry 1995 Indian English
4467 Alias Grace Margaret Atwood 1996 Canadian English
9938 Asylum Patrick McGrath 1996 British English
13304 Last Orders Graham Swift 1996 British English
17008 The Night In Question Tobias Wolff 1996 American English
5144 Quarantine Jim Crace 1997 British English
410 Underworld Don DeLillo 1997 American English
1876 Cold Mountain Charles Frazier 1997 American English
378 American Pastoral Philip Roth 1997 American English
15786 The Lady From Guatemala V. S. Pritchett 1957 British English