Zeit Library of 100 Non-Fiction Books

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Zeit-Bibliothek, 100 Books

The success of the Zeit Library of 100 Books led to the project being expanded five years later to include a collection of 100 non-fiction books, the Zeit-Bibliothek der 100 Sachbücher, with Raddatz again being in charge. The jury for this consisted of noted academics: Ralf Dahrendorf, Manfred Eigen, Theodor Eschenburg, Wolf Lepenies, Golo Mann, Alexander Mitscherlich, Fritz J. Raddatz, Thomas von Randow and Uta Ranke-Heinemann.

This list was originally published in 1984 and was added to this site over 1 year ago.

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Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
220 The Republic Plato -379 Greek Ancient greek
1192 The Politics Aristotle -350 Greek Ancient greek
1843 Euclid's Elements Euclid -300 Greek Ancient greek
1864 The Jewish War Flavius Josephus 75 Jewish Greek
334 Parallel Lives Plutarch 100 Greek Greek
313 Meditations Marcus Aurelius 161 Roman Greek
1459 The City of God Augustine 413 Roman Latin
653 Summa Theologica Thomas Aquinas 1274 Italian Latin
654 The Praise of Folly Erasmus 1511 Dutch Latin
1601 Three Treatises Martin Luther 1520 German German
152 The Prince Niccolo Machiavelli 1532 Italian Italian
2030 On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres Nicolaus Copernicus 1543 Polish Latin
515 Lives of the Artists Giorgio Vasari 1550 Italian Italian
863 Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems Galileo 1632 Italian Italian
1327 An Essay Concerning Human Understanding John Locke 1689 British English
345 Leviathan Thomas Hobbes 1651 British English
543 Discourse on Method Rene Descartes 1637 French French
6381 Of The Geometrical Spirit Blaise Pascal 1658 French French
374 Ethics Baruch de Spinoza 1677 Dutch Latin
2031 Theodicy Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz 1710 German French
1190 The Spirit Of The Laws Montesquieu 1748 French French
6381 An Essay On Universal History, The Manners, And Spirit Of Nations Voltaire 1756 French French
527 The Social Contract Jean-Jacques Rousseau 1762 French French
1997 An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding David Hume 1748 Scottish English
531 The Wealth of Nations Adam Smith 1776 Scottish English
6381 A Voyage Round The World Georg Forster 1777 German German
458 Critique of Pure Reason Immanuel Kant 1781 German German
6381 über Den Zwischenkiefer Der Menschen Und Der Tiere Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1820 German German
2031 über Den Umgang Mit Menschen Adolph Freiherr von Knigge 1788 German German
6381 Enquiries Into The Course Of Nature In The Development Of The Human Race Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi 1797 Swiss German
1477 An Essay on the Principle of Population Thomas Robert Malthus 1798 British English
1295 Phenomenology of Mind G. W. F. Hegel 1807 German German
1515 The World as Will and Idea Arthur Schopenhauer 1818 German German
6381 Nouveau Christianisme Bernardin de Saint-Pierre 1821 French French
1041 On War Carl Von Clausewitz 1832 German German
6381 The Life Of Jesus Critically Examined David Friedrich Strauss 1835 German German
229 Democracy in America Alexis de Tocqueville 1835 French French
6381 What Is Property? Pierre-Joseph Proudhon 1840 French French
2031 The Concept Of Anxiety Soren Kierkegaard 1844 Danish Danish
6381 The Condition Of The Working Class In England Friedrich Engels 1845 German German
4868 The Ego And Its Own Max Stirner 1844 German German
2031 History Of The Reformation In Germany Leopold von Ranke 1834 German German
1583 The Civilization Of The Renaissance In Italy Jacob Burckhardt 1860 Swiss German
180 On the Origin of Species Charles Darwin 1859 British English
2031 Cosmos Alexander von Humboldt 1845 German German
6381 Statism And Anarchy Mikhail Bakunin 1873 Russian Russian
2031 The History Of Rome Theodor Mommsen 1854 German German
222 Thus Spake Zarathustra Friedrich Nietzsche 1883 German German
6381 Friedrich Hebbels Tagebücher Friedrich Hebbel 1885 German German
6381 History Of Germany In The Nineteenth Century Heinrich von Treitschke 1879 German German
4864 The Foundations Of Arithmetic Gottlob Frege 1884 German German
328 Das Kapital Karl Marx 1867 German German
2031 The Crowd Gustave Le Bon 1895 French French
2031 Gedanken Und Erinnerungen Otto von Bismarck 1898 German German
2031 The Riddle Of The Universe Ernst Haeckel 1899 German German
4864 Scientific Autobiography and Other Papers Max Planck 1922 German German
2635 Logical Investigations Edmund Husserl 1900 German German
911 The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism Max Weber 1905 German German
3812 Reflections On Violence Georges Sorel 1908 French French
10989 Kompositionslehre Der Natur Jakob Johann von Uexküll 1980 German Unknown
315 Relativity Albert Einstein 1916 German German
6381 Grundfragen Der Soziologie Georg Simmel 1917 German German
1032 The Epistle To The Romans Karl Barth 1919 Swiss German
2031 Introduction To Mathematical Philosophy Bertrand Russell 1919 British English
1540 Decline of the West Oswald Spengler 1918 German German
369 Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus Ludwig Wittgenstein 1921 Austrian German
1601 The Ego and the Id Sigmund Freud 1923 Austrian German
1976 Towards A New Architecture Le Corbusier 1923 French French
1452 History And Class Consciousness Georg Lukacs 1923 German German
6381 Literature And Revolution Leon Trotsky 1924 Russian Russian
2031 Ideal Marriage, Its Physiology And Technique Theodoor H. van de Velde 1926 Dutch Dutch
517 Being and Time Martin Heidegger 1927 German German
2031 Sex And Repression In Savage Society Bronislaw Malinowski 1927 British English
850 The Revolt of the Masses José Ortega y Gasset 1930 Spanish Spanish
2031 Man In The Modern Age Karl Jaspers 1931 German German
1227 What Is To Be Done? Vladimir Il’ich Lenin 1902 Russian Russian
6435 Sex And Temperament In Three Primitive Societies Margaret Mead 1935 American English
645 A Study of History Arnold J. Toynbee 1934 British English
8194 Jesus Christ And Mythology Rudolf Bultmann 1958 German German
664 Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy Joseph A. Schumpeter 1942 Austrian English
638 Being and Nothingness Jean Paul Sartre 1943 French French
1147 Dialectic Of Enlightenment Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer 1944 German German
682 The Open Society and Its Enemies Karl Popper 1945 British English
2222 The Theory And Practice Of Hell Eugen Kogon 1950 German German
1051 The Phenomenon Of Man Pierre Teilhard de Chardin 1955 French French
1283 Cybernetics Norbert Wiener 1948 American English
140 The Second Sex Simone de Beauvoir 1949 French French
440 The Origins of Totalitarianism Hannah Arendt 1951 German English
379 The Second World War Winston Churchill 1948 British English
7927 Die Auflösung Der Weimarer Republik Karl Dietrich Bracher 1955 German German
1358 The Principle Of Hope Ernst Bloch 1954 German German
9147 Physics In My Generation Max Born 1968 German English
162 Silent Spring Rachel Carson 1962 American English
9147 Language And Mind Noam Chomsky 1968 American English
9147 Knowledge And Human Interests Jürgen Habermas 1968 German German
304 The Double Helix James D. Watson 1968 American English
2884 Physics And Beyond Werner Heisenberg 1971 German German
2309 Chance And Necessity Jacques Monod 1970 French French
1677 A Theory of Justice John Rawls 1971 American English
2296 The Limits To Growth Donella H. Meadows 1972 American English