The Greatest Memoir 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
69 The Diary of a Young Girl Anne Frank 1947 Dutch Dutch
149 Confessions Augustine 397 Roman Latin
153 I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings Maya Angelou 1969 American English
196 The Double Helix James D. Watson 1968 American English
247 The Gulag Archipelago Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn 1973 Russian Russian
254 If This Is a Man Primo Levi 1947 Italian Italian
273 The Year of Magical Thinking Joan Didion 2005 American English
304 Out of Africa Isak Dinesen 1937 Danish Danish
316 The Lover Marguerite Duras 1984 French French
353 Persepolis Marjane Satrapi 2000 French French
363 Let Us Now Praise Famous Men James Agee 1941 American English
366 The Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau Jean-Jacques Rousseau 1782 French French
411 Speak, Memory Vladimir Nabokov 1951 American English
416 Maus Art Spiegelman 1980 American English
435 Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance Robert M. Pirsig 1974 American English
444 Homage to Catalonia George Orwell 1938 British English
480 A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius Dave Eggers 2000 American English
502 Testament Of Youth Vera Brittain 1933 British English
503 Angela's Ashes Frank McCourt 1996 American English
507 The Education of Henry Adams Henry Adams 1907 American English
542 The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas Gertrude Stein 1933 American English
546 A Moveable Feast Ernest Hemingway 1964 American English
560 Dispatches Michael Herr 1977 American English
596 Black Boy Richard Wright 1945 American English
613 Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass Frederick Douglass 1845 American English
614 The Woman Warrior Maxine Hong Kingston 1976 American English
645 Night Elie Wiesel 1958 French French
673 Wild Swans Jung Chang 1991 Chinese English
699 On Writing Stephen King 2000 American English
711 Me Talk Pretty One Day David Sedaris 2000 American English
719 The Snow Leopard Peter Matthiessen 1978 American English
728 Man's Search for Meaning Viktor Frankl 1946 Austrian German
741 Notes of a Native Son James Baldwin 1955 American English
744 Good-Bye to All That Robert Graves 1929 British English
747 The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin Benjamin Franklin 1791 American English
757 Cider with Rosie Laurie Lee 1959 British English
847 A Long Way Gone Ishmael Beah 2007 Sierra Leonean English
863 Between the World and Me Ta-Nehisi Coates 2015 American English
869 The Color of Water James McBride 1995 American English
872 Experience Martin Amis 2000 British English
880 Down and Out in Paris and London George Orwell 1933 British English
882 Brown Girl Dreaming Jacqueline Woodson 2014 American English
892 West With the Night Beryl Markham 1942 British English
941 Family Life Akhil Sharma 2014 Indian English
981 What Is the What Dave Eggers 2006 American English
1012 The Words Jean Paul Sartre 1963 French French
1033 Memoirs From Beyond the Grave François-Auguste-René de Chateaubriand 1849 French French
1043 The Great Railway Bazaar Paul Theroux 1975 American English
1055 Dreams from My Father Barack Obama 1995 American English
1058 Blue Highways William Least Heat-Moon 1982 American English
1061 My Family And Other Animals Gerald Durrell 1956 British English
1127 The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano Olaudah Equiano 1789 African English
1147 Nickel And Dimed Barbara Ehrenreich 2001 American English
1157 History of My Life Giacomo Casanova 1822 Italian French
1158 This Boy's Life Tobias Wolff 1989 American English
1170 The Seven Storey Mountain Thomas Merton 1948 American English
1175 Woman at Point Zero Nawal El Saadawi 1975 Egyptian Arabic
1185 Promise at Dawn Romain Gary 1960 French French
1210 The Fire Next Time James Baldwin 1963 American English
1220 Journals André Gide 1948 French French
1226 Junky William S. Burroughs 1953 American English
1252 Autobiographies William Butler Yeats 1926 Irish English
1270 Kitchen Confidential Anthony Bourdain 2000 American English
1276 Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl Harriet Jacobs 1861 American English
1283 One Writer's Beginnings Eudora Welty 1984 American English
1312 Into Thin Air Jon Krakauer 1997 American English
1331 Sister Outsider Audre Lorde 1984 American English
1343 Into the Wild Jon Krakauer 1996 American English
1360 Twenty Years at Hull-House Jane Addams 1910 American English
1360 The Story of My Life Helen Keller 1903 American English
1408 Zami Audre Lorde 1982 American English
1417 Chronicles Bob Dylan 2004 American English
1425 The Drowned and the Saved Primo Levi 1986 Italian Italian
1464 The African Child Camara Laye 1953 Guinean French
1464 Christ Stopped at Eboli Carlo Levi 1945 Italian Italian
1464 A Writer's Diary Virginia Woolf 1953 British English
1496 Down Second Avenue Es'kia Mphahlele 1959 South African English
1528 The Bookseller of Kabul Asne Seierstad 2002 Norwegian Norwegian
1550 Wind, Sand and Stars Antoine de Saint-Exupéry 1939 French French
1588 The Liars' Club Mary Karr 1995 American English
1611 The Periodic Table Primo Levi 1975 Italian Italian
1621 Memories, Dreams, Reflections Carl Jung 1963 Swiss German
1621 This Bridge Called My Back Cherríe Moraga, Gloria Anzaldúa 1981 American English
1631 Up from Slavery Booker T. Washington 1901 American English
1637 My First Summer in the Sierra John Muir 1911 American English
1652 Persepolis Two Marjane Satrapi 2004 Iranian French
1653 All Over But The Shoutin' Rick Bragg 1997 American English
1664 Why We Can't Wait Martin Luther King 1964 American English
1667 W, or the Memory of Childhood Georges Perec 1975 French French
1675 My Fight for Birth Control Margaret Sanger 1931 American English
1726 Before Night Falls Reinaldo Arenas 1992 Cuban Spanish
1731 I, Rigoberta Menchú Rigoberta Menchú Tum 1983 Guatemalan Spanish
1770 Family Sayings Natalia Ginzburg 1963 Italian Italian
1769 The Life Of Arseniev Ivan Bunin 1930 Russian Russian
1776 When Breath Becomes Air Paul Kalanithi 2016 American English
1777 Satyagraha in South Africa Gandhi 1928 Indian Gujarati
1777 March John Lewis 2013 American English
1797 The Armies of the Night Norman Mailer 1968 American English
1797 Far From the Tree Andrew Solomon 2012 American English
1808 Just Kids Patti Smith 2010 American English
1821 Fun Home Alison Bechdel 2006 American English
1826 A Tale of Love and Darkness Amos Oz 2002 Israeli Hebrew
1845 The Road from Coorain Jill Ker Conway 1989 Australian English
1882 Sleepless Nights Elizabeth Hardwick 1979 American English
1895 Diaries Alan Clark 1993 British English
1895 We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live Joan Didion 2006 American English
1895 Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands Mary Seacole 1857 Jamaican English
1916 The Argonauts Maggie Nelson 2015 American English
1930 The Forever War Dexter Filkins 2008 American English
1985 Coming Of Age In Mississippi Anne Moody 1968 American English
1985 Old Glory Jonathan Raban 1981 British English
2012 A Fortunate Life A. B. Facey 1981 Australian English
2019 Dust Tracks on a Road Zora Neale Hurston 1942 American English
2036 We Don’t Know Ourselves Fintan O'Toole 2021 Irish English
2042 Living My Life Emma Goldman 1931 American English
2042 Silences Tillie Olsen 1978 American English
2064 Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! Richard P. Feynman 1985 American English
2104 A Childhood Harry Crews 1978 American English
2106 My Struggle Karl Ove Knausgård 2009 Norwegian Norwegian
2113 Zeitoun Dave Eggers 2009 American English