The Greatest Experimental 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
2 Ulysses James Joyce 1922 Irish English
53 The Life And Opinions Of Tristram Shandy Laurence Sterne 1759 British English
103 Pale Fire Vladimir Nabokov 1962 American English
172 The Waste Land T. S. Eliot 1922 British English
179 U.S.A. Trilogy John Dos Passos 1930 American English
218 Molloy Samuel Beckett 1951 Irish French
228 A Season in Hell Arthur Rimbaud 1873 French French
233 Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas Hunter S. Thompson 1971 American English
236 The Counterfeiters André Gide 1925 French French
239 Death of Virgil Hermann Broch 1945 Austrian German
258 Tropic of Cancer Henry Miller 1934 American English
278 Thus Spake Zarathustra Friedrich Nietzsche 1883 German German
284 The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner James Hogg 1824 Scottish English
292 The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle Haruki Murakami 1994 Japanese Japanese
294 2666 Roberto Bolaño 2004 Chilean Spanish
300 Finnegans Wake James Joyce 1939 Irish English
305 The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test Tom Wolfe 1968 American English
307 Speak, Memory Vladimir Nabokov 1951 American English
308 Infinite Jest David Foster Wallace 1996 American English
313 Malone Dies Samuel Beckett 1951 Irish French
335 The Education of Henry Adams Henry Adams 1907 American English
345 At Swim Two-Birds Flann O'Brien 1939 Irish English
354 The Book of Disquiet Fernando Pessoa 1982 Portuguese Portuguese
357 Gravity's Rainbow Thomas Pynchon 1973 American English
364 Nightwood Djuna Barnes 1936 American English
365 Austerlitz W. G. Sebald 2001 German German
374 Gormenghast Mervyn Peake 1950 British English
376 Ferdydurke Witold Gombrowicz 1937 Polish Polish
379 Critique of Pure Reason Immanuel Kant 1781 German German
381 Naked Lunch William S. Burroughs 1959 American English
385 Life, a User's Manual Georges Perec 1978 French French
391 The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas Gertrude Stein 1933 American English
392 Cloud Atlas David Mitchell 2004 British English
396 The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge Rainer Maria Rilke 1910 German German
406 Ada or Ardor Vladimir Nabokov 1969 American English
425 The Savage Detectives Roberto Bolaño 1998 Chilean Spanish
427 Amerika Franz Kafka 1927 Czech German
432 Hopscotch Julio Cortazar 1963 Argentinian Spanish
440 The Glass Bead Game Hermann Hesse 1943 German German
441 If on a Winter's Night a Traveller Italo Calvino 1979 Italian Italian
445 Pensées Blaise Pascal 1670 French French
447 The Unnamable Samuel Beckett 1953 Irish French
454 Jacques the Fatalist and His Master Denis Diderot 1796 French French
457 Titus Groan Mervyn Peake 1946 British English
468 Poet in New York Federico García Lorca 1940 Spanish Spanish
485 Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus Ludwig Wittgenstein 1921 Austrian German
486 Froth on the daydream Boris Vian 1947 French French
491 Philosophical Investigations Ludwig Wittgenstein 1953 Austrian German
583 Crash J. G. Ballard 1973 British English
600 Jakob Von Gunten Robert Walser 1909 Swiss German
601 The Hour of the Star Clarice Lispector 1977 Brazilian Portuguese
604 The Words Jean Paul Sartre 1963 French French
615 V Thomas Pynchon 1963 American English
617 Howl and Other Poems Allen Ginsberg 1956 American English
621 Nadja André Breton 1928 French French
647 Jealousy Alain Robbe-Grillet 1957 French French
664 The Songs of Maldoror Comte de Lautréamont 1868 French French
671 Four Quartets T. S. Eliot 1943 British English
700 W, or the Memory of Childhood Georges Perec 1975 French French
716 The Recognitions William Gaddis 1955 American English
741 Three Trapped Tigers Guillermo Cabrera Infante 1965 Cuban Spanish
749 Auto Da Fé Elias Canetti 1935 Bulgarian German
753 Anniversaries Uwe Johnson 1970 German German
763 Being and Nothingness Jean Paul Sartre 1943 French French
774 Alcools Guillaume Apollinaire 1913 French French
816 Moravagine Blaise Cendrars 1926 Swiss French
820 The Solitudes Luis de Góngora 1613 Spanish Spanish
821 Where I'm Calling From Raymond Carver 1988 American English
827 Greguerias Ramón Gómez de la Serna 1910 Spanish Spanish
830 The Rings of Saturn W. G. Sebald 1995 German German
842 The Making of Americans Gertrude Stein 1925 American English
885 Dhalgren Samuel R. Delany 1975 American English
893 Speedboat Renata Adler 1976 American English
915 Mythologies Roland Barthes 1957 French French
917 True History of the Kelly Gang Peter Carey 2000 Australian English
918 Against Nature J. K. Huysmans 1884 French French
927 Franny and Zooey J. D. Salinger 1961 American English
935 Ubik Philip K. Dick 1969 American English
938 The Hive Camilo José Cela 1951 Spanish Spanish
949 The Life and Opinions of the Tomcat Murr E. T. A. Hoffmann 1819 German German
954 Lincoln in the Bardo George Saunders 2017 American English
969 Ways Of Seeing John Berger 1972 British English
978 My Struggle Karl Ove Knausgård 2009 Norwegian Norwegian
984 Outline Rachel Cusk 2014 British English
1017 The New York Trilogy Paul Auster 1985 American English
1025 The Complete Poetry and Prose of William Blake William Blake 1827 British English
1026 Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance Robert M. Pirsig 1974 American English
1060 Extinction Thomas Bernhard 1986 Austrian German
1064 Paroles Jacques Prévert 1946 French French
1067 My Name is Red Orhan Pamuk 1998 Turkish Turkish
1070 The Beauty Of The Husband Anne Carson 2001 Canadian English
1074 Three Lives Gertrude Stein 1909 American English
1082 Jesus' Son Denis Johnson 1992 American English
1086 Herland Charlotte Perkins Gilman 1915 American English
1091 The Last Samurai Helen DeWitt 2000 American English
1122 Second Thoughts Michel Butor 1957 French French
1144 Murphy Samuel Beckett 1938 Irish English
1164 House of Leaves Mark Z. Danielewski 2000 American English
1202 The Hours Michael Cunningham 1998 American English
1213 Erasure Percival Everett 2001 American English
1227 Titus Alone Mervyn Peake 1959 British English
1232 The Piano Teacher Elfriede Jelinek 1983 Austrian German
1233 Aspects of the Novel E. M. Forster 1927 British English
1244 Cathedral Raymond Carver 1983 American English
1256 Prufrock and Other Observations T. S. Eliot 1917 British English
1266 Living Henry Green 1929 British English
1272 The Vegetarian Han Kang 2007 Korean Korean
1283 Gödel, Escher, Bach Douglas Hofstadter 1979 American English
1288 Lanark Alasdair Gray 1981 Scottish English
1290 Ariel Sylvia Plath 1965 American English
1292 Mumbo Jumbo Ishmael Reed 1972 American English
1295 Justine Lawrence Durrell 1957 British English
1307 Against Interpretation Susan Sontag 1966 American English
1323 Story of the Eye Georges Bataille 1928 French French
1354 The Medium Is The Massage Marshall McLuhan 1967 Canadian English
1360 A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again David Foster Wallace 1997 American English
1367 All about H. Hatterr G. V. Desani 1948 Indian English
1375 The Street of Crocodiles Bruno Schulz 1934 Polish Polish
1389 The Passion Jeanette Winterson 1987 British English
1414 Illuminations Arthur Rimbaud 1886 French French