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 759 '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
721 Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1795 German German
722 Bastard Out of Carolina Dorothy Allison 1992 American English
723 The Line of Beauty Alan Hollinghurst 2004 British English
724 Michael Kohlhaas Heinrich von Kleist 1810 German German
725 The Kingdom of This World Alejo Carpentier 1949 Cuban Spanish
726 The Caine Mutiny Herman Wouk 1951 American English
727 The Street of Crocodiles Bruno Schulz 1934 Polish Polish
728 Erewhon Samuel Butler 1872 British English
729 Thérèse Desqueyroux François Mauriac 1927 French French
730 Petersburg Andrei Bely 1913 Russian Russian
731 The Mysteries of Udolpho Ann Radcliffe 1794 British English
732 A Bend in the River V. S. Naipaul 1979 Trinidadian English
733 Arrow of God Chinua Achebe 1964 Nigerian English
734 Loving Henry Green 1945 British English
735 A Suitable Boy Vikram Seth 1993 Indian English
736 Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam Edward FitzGerald 1859 British English
737 The Custom of the Country Edith Wharton 1913 American English
738 The Joy Luck Club Amy Tan 1989 American English
739 The Return of the Native Thomas Hardy 1878 British English
740 Silence Shūsaku Endō 1966 Japanese Japanese
741 The Goldfinch Donna Tartt 2013 American English
742 The Crime of Father Amaro Eça de Queirós 1875 Portuguese Portuguese
743 On Liberty John Stuart Mill 1859 British English
744 Moscow to the End of the Line Venedikt Yerofeev 1970 Russian Russian
745 Memed, My Hawk Yashar Kemal 1955 Turkish Turkish
746 Nervous Conditions Tsitsi Dangarembga 1988 Zimbabwean English
747 Blonde Joyce Carol Oates 2000 American English
748 Howl and Other Poems Allen Ginsberg 1956 American English
749 The Fire Next Time James Baldwin 1963 American English
750 Money Martin Amis 1984 British English
751 All the Pretty Horses Cormac McCarthy 1992 American English
752 Poems Of Thomas Hardy Thomas Hardy 1898 British English
753 Henderson The Rain King Saul Bellow 1959 American English
754 If I Forget Thee, Jerusalem William Faulkner 1939 American English
755 The Well of Loneliness Radclyffe Hall 1928 British English
756 The Labyrinth of Solitude Octavio Paz 1950 Mexican Spanish
757 The Adventures of Caleb Williams William Godwin 1794 British English
758 Dandelion Wine Ray Bradbury 1957 American English
759 Thérèse Raquin Émile Zola 1867 French French
760 Decline and Fall Evelyn Waugh 1928 British English
761 Goodbye to Berlin Christopher Isherwood 1939 British English
762 Ballet Shoes Noel Streatfeild 1936 British English
763 The Case of Comrade Tulayev Victor Serge 1949 French French
764 Mother Maxim Gorky 1906 Russian Russian
765 The Thorn Birds Colleen McCullough 1977 Australian English
766 Adolphe Benjamin Constant 1816 Swiss French
767 The Tree of Man Patrick White 1955 Australian English
768 A Glastonbury Romance John Cowper Powys 1932 British English
769 A Voyage To Arcturus David Lindsay 1920 Scottish English
770 The Underground Railroad Colson Whitehead 2016 American English
771 God's Bits of Wood Ousmane Sembène 1960 Senegalese French
772 The Group Mary McCarthy 1963 American English
773 The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym Edgar Allan Poe 1838 American English
774 A Vindication of the Rights of Woman Mary Wollstonecraft 1792 British English
775 Cheese Willem Elsschot 1933 Belgian Dutch
776 War with the Newts Karel Čapek 1936 Czech Czech
777 I Am Legend Richard Matheson 1954 American English
778 The Cat in the Hat Dr. Seuss 1957 American English
779 The Outsiders S. E. Hinton 1967 American English
780 Maxims François duc de La Rochefoucauld 1665 French French
781 Simplicius Simplicissimus Hans Jakob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen 1668 German German
782 Three Men in a Boat Jerome K. Jerome 1889 British English
783 Anabasis Xenophon -390 Greek Ancient greek
784 Rabbit at Rest John Updike 1990 American English
785 The Stechlin Theodor Fontane 1898 German German
786 The Far Pavilions Mary Margaret Kaye 1978 British English
787 Quotations from Chairman Mao Mao 1964 Chinese Chinese
788 Roots Alex Haley 1976 American English
789 The Piano Teacher Elfriede Jelinek 1983 Austrian German
790 The Mask of Dimitrios Eric Ambler 1939 British English
791 Gone Girl Gillian Flynn 2012 American English
792 A Kestrel for a Knave Barry Hines 1968 British English
793 The Sirens of Titan Kurt Vonnegut 1959 American English
794 The Royal Game Stefan Zweig 1941 Austrian German
795 Baby And Child Care Benjamin Spock 1946 American English
796 The Fall Albert Camus 1956 French French
797 The Manuscript Found in Saragossa Jan Potocki 1805 Polish French
798 The Life Of Arseniev Ivan Bunin 1930 Russian Russian
799 Kaputt Curzio Malaparte 1944 Italian Italian
800 The Loved One Evelyn Waugh 1948 British English
801 The Mysterious Affair at Styles Agatha Christie 1920 British English
802 Romance of the Three Kingdoms Guanzhong Luo 1400 Chinese Chinese
803 Sophie's Choice William Styron 1979 American English
804 The Vegetarian Han Kang 2007 Korean Korean
805 Gaudy Night Dorothy L. Sayers 1935 British English
806 The Story of Art Ernest H. Gombrich 1950 British English
807 The Book of the City of Ladies Christine De Pizan 1405 French French
808 Watchmen Alan Moore 1986 American, British English
809 Poems by Machado Antonio Machado 1907 Spanish Spanish
810 Amadis of Gaul Garci R. de Montalvo 1508 Spanish Spanish
811 The Phantom of the Opera Gaston Leroux 1909 French French
812 Collected Poems of T.S. Eliot T. S. Eliot 1963 British English
813 Cranford Elizabeth Gaskell 1851 British English
814 The Secret Garden Frances Hodgson Burnett 1911 British English
815 Around the World in Eighty Days Jules Verne 1872 French French
816 The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia Samuel Johnson, Abraham Raimbach, Robert Smirke 1759 British English
817 Rickshaw Boy Lao She 1936 Chinese Chinese
818 The African Child Camara Laye 1953 Guinean French
819 Burmese Days George Orwell 1934 British English
820 The Captive Mind Czesław Miłosz 1953 Polish Polish
821 Castle Rackrent Maria Edgeworth 1800 British English
822 I, Robot Isaac Asimov 1950 American English
823 The Snowy Day Ezra Jack Keats 1962 American English
824 Rhymes And Legends Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer 1871 Spanish Spanish
825 In Our Time Ernest Hemingway 1925 American English
826 Voss Patrick White 1957 Australian English
827 Fear of Flying Erica Jong 1973 American English
828 Lost Horizon James Hilton 1933 British English
829 The Road to Serfdom Friedrich von Hayek 1944 Austrian English
830 The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Edward Gibbon 1776 British English
831 Riddle of the Sands Erskine Childers 1903 British English
832 The Last Of The Just André Schwarz-Bart 1959 French French
833 The Lost Steps Alejo Carpentier 1953 Cuban Spanish
834 Story of O Pauline Reage 1954 French French
835 The Art of War Sun Tzu -500 Chinese Classical chinese
836 Second Thoughts Michel Butor 1957 French French
837 The Sellout Paul Beatty 2015 American English
838 The Book of Daniel E. L. Doctorow 1971 American English
839 Winnetou Karl May 1893 German German
840 Confessions of a Mask Yukio Mishima 1949 Japanese Japanese