100 Great 20th Century English-language Works of Fiction by Women

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

About this list

Feminista!, 96 Books

Feminista! created this list in response to the infamous Modern Library list. Here's their description:

While we’d [Feminista!] agree that the Modern Library’s list features some extraordinary and wonderful works of fiction, we’re a little dismayed by a list of major 20th century English language novels that completely overlooks such writers as Margaret Atwood, Nadine Gordimer, Zora Neale Hurston, Harper Lee, Doris Lessing, Toni Morrison and Sylvia Plath. We could go on, but instead we’ve compiled our own list of 100 Great 20th Century English-language Works of Fiction by Women. In order to choose the works on the list, women’s online forums and lists were canvassed. Unlike the Modern Library’s, our list is not ranked. We’ve also restricted it to one work per author, since our aim was to showcase the extraordinary richness and variety of 20th century fiction by women.

This list was originally published in 1998 and was added to this site over 2 years ago.

View: List Grid Table
Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
722 Bastard Out of Carolina Dorothy Allison 1992 American English
521 I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings Maya Angelou 1969 American English
1649 Cat's Eye Margaret Atwood 1988 Canadian English
2854 The Bottle Factory Outing Beryl Bainbridge 1974 British English
7620 Gorilla, My Love Toni Cade Bambara 1972 American English
269 Nightwood Djuna Barnes 1936 American English
849 Regeneration Pat Barker 1991 British English
3808 Hotel du Lac Anita Brookner 1984 British English
1536 Rubyfruit Jungle Rita Mae Brown 1973 American English
281 The Good Earth Pearl S. Buck 1931 American English
718 Possession A. S. Byatt 1990 British English
628 Nights At The Circus Angela Carter 1984 British English
3437 So Far From God Ana Castillo 1993 American English
160 My Antonia Willa Cather 1918 American English
271 The Awakening Kate Chopin 1899 American English
1634 The House on Mango Street Sandra Cisneros 1984 American English
5862 Elders And Betters Ivy Compton-Burnett 1944 British English
2537 Clear Light of Day Anita Desai 1980 Indian English
416 Out of Africa Isak Dinesen 1937 Danish Danish
8835 Stones For Ibarra Harriet Doerr 1984 American English
3236 The Radiant Way Margaret Drabble 1987 British English
59 Rebecca Daphne du Maurier 1938 British English
3098 Second-class Citizen Buchi Emecheta 1974 Nigerian English
10738 Tracks Louise Erdrich 1988 American English
17126 At Freddie's Penelope Fitzgerald 1982 British English
4297 Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe Fannie Flagg 1987 American English
6274 Owls Do Cry Janet Frame 1957 New Zealand English
2659 The Women's Room Marilyn French 1977 American English
17126 The Mind Body Problem Rebecca Goldstein 1983 American English
1852 July's People Nadine Gordimer 1981 South African English
17126 The Rest Of Life Mary Gordon 1993 American English
755 The Well of Loneliness Radclyffe Hall 1928 British English
14897 When Rain Clouds Gather Bessie Head 1968 Botswana English
143 The Talented Mr. Ripley Patricia Highsmith 1955 American English
17126 The Furies Janet Hobhouse 1984 American English
1145 The Bone People Keri Hulme 1984 New Zealand English
68 Their Eyes Were Watching God Zora Neale Hurston 1937 American English
215 The Haunting of Hill House Shirley Jackson 1959 American English
4871 Heat and Dust Ruth Prawer Jhabvala 1975 Indian English
827 Fear of Flying Erica Jong 1973 American English
14984 Lucy Jamaica Kincaid 1990 Antiguan English
2098 The Bean Trees Barbara Kingsolver 1988 American English
2633 Tripmaster Monkey Maxine Hong Kingston 1989 American English
1890 Obasan Joy Kogawa 1981 Canadian English
17126 The Fire Dwellers Margaret Laurence 1969 Canadian English
16 To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee 1960 American English
61 The Golden Notebook Doris May Lessing 1962 British English
6365 Moon Tiger Penelope Lively 1987 British English
1167 Gentlemen Prefer Blondes Anita Loos 1925 American English
9277 The Balkan Trilogy Olivia Manning 1960 British English
772 The Group Mary McCarthy 1963 American English
1458 The Ballad of the Sad Cafe Carson McCullers 1951 American English
17126 Mama Terry McMillan 1987 American English
1231 Patience And Sarah Isabel Miller 1969 American English
58 Gone With the Wind Margaret Mitchell 1936 American English
3111 Anagrams Lorrie Moore 1986 American English
49 Beloved Toni Morrison 1987 American English
14173 Wife Bharati Mukherjee 1975 Indian English
933 Lives of Girls and Women Alice Munro 1971 Canadian English
1584 A Severed Head Iris Murdoch 1961 British English
14984 The House Of Splendid Isolation Edna O'Brien 1994 Irish English
208 A Good Man Is Hard to Find Flannery O'Connor 1953 American English
2125 Tell Me a Riddle Tillie Olsen 1961 American English
7592 Enormous Changes at the Last Minute Grace Paley 1974 American English
14984 Complete Stories Dorothy Parker 1995 American English
14176 Black Tickets Jayne Anne Phillips 1979 American English
17126 Braided Lives Marge Piercy 1982 American English
103 The Bell Jar Sylvia Plath 1963 American English
2314 Ship Of Fools Katherine Anne Porter 1962 American English
17126 The Golden Spur Dawn Powell 1962 American English
488 The Shipping News Annie Proulx 1993 Canadian English
434 The Fountainhead Ayn Rand 1943 American English
14230 The King Must Die Mary Renault 1958 British English
158 Wide Sargasso Sea Jean Rhys 1966 British English
331 Housekeeping Marilynne Robinson 1980 American English
359 The God of Small Things Arundhati Roy 1997 Indian English
4307 Mrs. Stevens Hears The Mermaids Singing May Sarton 1965 American English
1697 The Stone Diaries Carol Shields 1993 Canadian English
17126 The Weight Of Water Anita Shreve 1997 American English
10302 Anywhere But Here Mona Simpson 1986 American English
2454 By Grand Central Station I Sat Down And Wept Elizabeth Smart 1945 Canadian English
17126 The Age Of Grief Jane Smiley 1987 American English
14984 The Volcano Lover Susan Sontag 1992 American English
169 The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie Muriel Spark 1961 British, Scottish English
1859 Angel Elizabeth Taylor 1957 British English
738 The Joy Luck Club Amy Tan 1989 American English
17126 If Morning Ever Comes Anne Tyler 1964 American English
14984 Away Jane Urquhart 1993 Canadian English
157 The Color Purple Alice Walker 1982 American English
2981 The Life And Loves Of A She Devil Fay Weldon 1983 British English
1379 The Collected Stories of Eudora Welty Eudora Welty 1980 American English
1220 The Return of the Soldier Rebecca West 1918 British English
490 Ethan Frome Edith Wharton 1911 American English
2454 Frost In May Antonia White 1933 British English
1461 Oranges are not the only Fruit Jeanette Winterson 1985 British English
32 Mrs. Dalloway Virginia Woolf 1925 British English