The Greatest Books of All Time

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This list represents a comprehensive and trusted collection of the greatest books. Developed through a specialized algorithm, it brings together 743 'best of' book lists to form a definitive guide to the world's most acclaimed books. For those interested in how these books are chosen, additional details can be found on the rankings page.

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Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
2401 The Fight Norman Mailer 1975 American English
2402 That They May Face the Rising Sun John McGahern 2002 Irish English
2403 The Joys Of Motherhood Buchi Emecheta 1979 Nigerian English
2404 The Fear Of Freedom Erich Fromm 1941 German English
2405 The Americanization of Edward Bok Edward Bok 1920 American English
2406 Loitering With Intent Muriel Spark 1981 British English
2407 The Stars My Destination Alfred Bester 1956 American English
2408 Educated Tara Westover 2018 American English
2409 Lyrical Ballads William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge 1798 British English
2410 There There Tommy Orange 2018 American English
2411 Bright Lights, Big City Jay McInerney 1984 American English
2412 The Age of Jackson Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr 1945 American English
2413 A Mathematician's Apology G. H. Hardy 1940 British English
2414 The Melancholy of Resistance László Krasznahorkai 1989 Hungarian Hungarian
2415 Natural Right and History Leo Strauss 1953 American English
2416 Phaedrus Plato -370 Greek Ancient greek
2417 Galileo Bertolt Brecht 1938 German German
2418 Into Thin Air Jon Krakauer 1997 American English
2419 Platform Michel Houellebecq 2001 French French
2420 Soul Mountain Xingjian Gao 1990 Chinese Chinese
2421 The Tiger Who Came to Tea Judith Kerr 1968 British English
2422 A View From The Bridge Arthur Miller 1955 American English
2423 The Intuitionist Colson Whitehead 1999 American English
2424 The Physicists Friedrich Dürrenmatt 1962 Swiss German
2426 The Einstein Intersection Samuel R. Delany 1967 American English
2425 The Call Of Cthulhu H. P. Lovecraft 1928 American English
2427 The Forever War Joe Haldeman 1974 American English
2428 The Scarlet Pimpernel Baroness Emmuska Orczy 1905 British English
2429 Modern Times Paul Johnson 1983 British English
2430 Nine Horrors And A Dream Joseph Payne Brennan 1958 American English
2431 The Railway Children Edith Nesbit 1906 British English
2432 The Crow Road Iain Banks 1992 British English
2433 Julius Caesar William Shakespeare 1623 British English
2434 Puckoon Spike Milligan 1963 Irish English
2435 Poems Of Anna Akhmatova Anna Akhmatova 1912 Russian Russian
2436 A Rage In Harlem Chester Himes 1957 American English
2439 How Green Was My Valley Richard Llewellyn 1939 British English
2437 The Ascent Of Rum Doodle W. E. Bowman 1956 British English
2438 Pudd'nhead Wilson Mark Twain 1894 American English
2440 The Space Merchants Frederik Pohl, C. M. Kornbluth 1952 American English
2441 The Map And The Territory Michel Houellebecq 2010 French French
2442 Blindness Henry Green 1926 British English
2442 The Rector's Daughter F. M. Mayor 1924 British English
2444 Bostan Saadi 1257 Persian Persian
2445 Henry V William Shakespeare 1600 British English
2446 Worse Things Waiting Manly Wade Wellman 1973 American English
2447 Joy in the Morning P. G. Wodehouse 1946 British English
2448 Black Mischief Evelyn Waugh 1932 British English
2449 The Sign of Four Arthur Conan Doyle 1890 British English
2450 By Grand Central Station I Sat Down And Wept Elizabeth Smart 1945 Canadian English
2450 Frost In May Antonia White 1933 British English
2450 Molesworth Geoffrey Willans, Ronald Searle 1953 British English
2453 The Prisoner Of Zenda Anthony Hope 1894 British English
2456 Men At Arms Evelyn Waugh 1952 British English
2454 Shirley Charlotte Brontë 1849 British English
2456 The League Of Frightened Men Rex Stout 1935 American English
2455 Lark Rise To Candleford Flora Thompson 1945 British English
2458 Poems Of William Cullen Bryant William Cullen Bryant 1821 American English
2459 The Silent Duchess Dacia Maraini 1990 Italian Italian
2460 Non Stop Brian Aldiss 1958 British English
2461 La Grande Maison Mohammed Dib 1952 Algerian French
2462 Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage Alice Munro 2001 Canadian English
2463 On Beauty Zadie Smith 2005 British English
2464 The Hill Of Dreams Arthur Machen 1907 British English
2465 Hyperion Dan Simmons 1989 American English
2466 The Grey King Susan Cooper 1975 British English
2467 Roll, Jordan, Roll Eugene Genovese 1974 American English
2468 Fall On Your Knees Ann-Marie MacDonald 1996 Canadian English
2469 On Obligations Marcus Tullius Cicero -44 Roman Latin
2470 Essays And Criticism William Hazlitt 1823 British English
2471 The Last Battle C. S. Lewis 1956 British English
2472 Quatermass And The Pit Nigel Kneale 1959 British English
2473 L'acacia Claude Simon 1989 French French
2474 Artemisia Anna Banti 1947 Italian Italian
2475 The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich William L. Shirer 1960 American English
2476 Mangeclous Albert Cohen 1938 French French
2477 Blood and Guts in High School Kathy Acker 1978 American English
2478 The Cider House Rules John Irving 1985 American English
2479 The Firm John Grisham 1991 American English
2480 The Good War Studs Terkel 1984 American English
2481 Small Island Andrea Levy 2004 British English
2482 The Golden Compass Philip Pullman 1995 British English
2483 Measuring the World Daniel Kehlmann 2005 German German
2484 The Millstone Margaret Drabble 1965 British English
2485 Murder In The Cathedral T. S. Eliot 1935 British English
2486 The Moon And Sixpence W. Somerset Maugham 1919 British English
2487 A Lesson Before Dying Ernest J. Gaines 1993 American English
2488 All Souls Javier Marias 1989 Spanish Spanish
2489 Miramar Naguib Mahfouz 1967 Egyptian Arabic
2490 Rogue Moon Algis Budrys 1960 American English
2491 The Garden Of Forking Paths Jorge Luis Borges 1941 Argentinian Spanish
2492 Mortals Norman Rush 2003 American English
2493 Room Emma Donoghue 2010 Irish English
2494 The South Pole Roald Amundsen 1912 Norwegian Norwegian
2494 Psychopathia Sexualis Richard von Krafft-Ebing 1886 German German
2496 Rebellion In The Backlands Euclides da Cunha 1902 Brazilian Portuguese
2497 Popol Vuh Dennis Tedlock 1985 Mayan K'iche'
2498 Homegoing Yaa Gyasi 2016 Ghanaian English
2499 The Prairie James Fenimore Cooper 1827 American English
2500 Pastoralia George Saunders 2000 American English
2501 Memoirs of Louis XIV Louis de Rouvroy Saint-Simon (duc de) 1740 French French
2502 Mrs. Bridge Evan S. Connell 1959 American English
2503 The Abyss Marguerite Yourcenar 1968 French French
2504 Metaphysics Aristotle -347 Greek Ancient greek
2505 Curial e Güelfa Unknown 1450 Spanish Catalan
2506 Life With A Star Jiří Weil 1949 Czech Czech
2507 On the Black Hill Bruce Chatwin 1982 British English
2508 Howl, Kaddish And Other Poems Allen Ginsberg 1956 American English
2509 Deathbird Stories Harlan Ellison 1975 American English
2510 The New Sorrows of Young W. Ulrich Plenzdorf 1972 German German
2511 L.A. Confidential James Ellroy 1990 American English
2512 Hippolytus Euripides -428 Greek Ancient greek
2513 Rites of Passage William Golding 1980 British English
2514 The American Way of Death Jessica Mitford 1963 American English
2515 A Flight Of Curlews Maarten 't Hart 1978 Dutch Dutch
2516 Waiting For God Simone Weil 1950 French French
2517 The Happy Prince And Other Tales Oscar Wilde 1888 British English
2518 The Passage Of Power Robert Caro 2012 American English
2519 Old Filth Jane Gardam 2004 British English
2520 Beyond the Pleasure Principle Sigmund Freud 1920 Austrian German