The Greatest Books of All Time on Change

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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
60 Things Fall Apart Chinua Achebe 1958 Nigerian English
136 The Wind in the Willows Kenneth Grahame 1908 British English
194 Oblomov Ivan Goncharov 1859 Russian Russian
281 The Good Earth Pearl S. Buck 1931 American English
390 The Old Wives' Tale Arnold Bennett 1908 British English
426 The Moon and the Bonfires Cesare Pavese 1950 Italian Italian
487 Rainbow D.H. Lawrence 1915 British English
594 Growth of the Soil Knut Hamsun 1917 Norwegian Norwegian
639 Reflections on the Revolution in France Edmund Burke 1790 British English
665 The Family Moskat Isaac Bashevis Singer 1950 Polish Yiddish
677 Lud-in-the-Mist Hope Mirrlees 1926 British English
720 The Professor's House Willa Cather 1925 American English
732 A Bend in the River V. S. Naipaul 1979 Trinidadian English
733 Arrow of God Chinua Achebe 1964 Nigerian English
785 The Stechlin Theodor Fontane 1898 German German
813 Cranford Elizabeth Gaskell 1851 British English
877 The Cherry Orchard Anton Chekhov 1904 Russian Russian
912 The Making of Americans Gertrude Stein 1925 American English
1024 Some Prefer Nettles Junichiro Tanizaki 1929 Japanese Japanese
1027 Secondhand Time Svetlana Alexievich 2013 Belarusian Russian
1102 I Ching China -1000 Chinese Chinese
1143 Tevye The Dairyman And The Railroad Stories Sholem Aleichem 1894 Jewish Yiddish
1152 The Wapshot Chronicle John Cheever 1957 American English
1285 Selected Stories of Alice Munro Alice Munro 1996 Canadian English
1328 Parable Of The Sower Octavia E. Butler 1993 American English
1343 The Hamlet William Faulkner 1940 American English
1348 Sandman Neil Gaiman 1989 British English
1360 The Makioka Sisters Junichiro Tanizaki 1948 Japanese Japanese
1364 Fragments Heraclitus -500 Greek Ancient greek
1379 The Collected Stories of Eudora Welty Eudora Welty 1980 American English
1415 Life on the Mississippi Mark Twain 1883 American English
1630 Halbzeit Martin Walser 1960 German German
1806 Moominland Midwinter Tove Jansson 1957 Finnish Swedish
1852 July's People Nadine Gordimer 1981 South African English
1857 A Lost Lady Willa Cather 1923 American English
2083 The Memoirs of a Survivor Doris May Lessing 1974 British English
2192 American Gods Neil Gaiman 2001 British English
2273 The Accidental Tourist Anne Tyler 1985 American English
2306 The Old Forest Peter Taylor 1985 American English
2331 Sunset Song Lewis Grassic Gibbon 1932 Scottish English
2346 A Summons to Memphis Peter Taylor 1986 American English
2408 That They May Face the Rising Sun John McGahern 2002 Irish English
2511 On the Black Hill Bruce Chatwin 1982 British English
2541 The Artamonov Business Maxim Gorky 1925 Russian Russian
2619 To Live Yu Hua 1993 Chinese Chinese
2641 The Power Naomi Alderman 2016 British English
2663 Debit And Credit Gustav Freytag 1855 German German
2782 Mountain Interval Robert Frost 1916 American English
2799 Delta Wedding Eudora Welty 1946 American English
2814 The Golden Apples Eudora Welty 1949 American English
2894 Teahouse Lao She 1957 Chinese Chinese
2899 City Clifford D. Simak 1952 American English
2936 Jauche Und Levkojen Christine Brückner 1975 German German
2961 Au Bonheur Des Dames Émile Zola 1883 French French
2996 Staying On Paul Scott 1977 British English
3052 National Episodes Benito Pérez Galdós 1873 Spanish Spanish
3055 The Enigma of Arrival V. S. Naipaul 1987 British English
3160 Weights And Measures Joseph Roth 1937 Austrian German
3174 Spring And All William Carlos Williams 1923 American English
3227 Ghachar Ghochar Vivek Shanbhag 2015 Indian Kannada
3261 Chronicle In Stone Ismail Kadare 1971 Albanian Albanian
3324 A Day in Spring Ciril Kosmač 1953 Slovenian Slovene
3381 Der Laden Erwin Strittmatter 1983 German German
3434 Horseman, Pass By Larry McMurtry 1961 American English
3443 Transit Rachel Cusk 2016 British English
3616 11 22 63 Stephen King 2011 American English
3631 I And My Chimney Herman Melville 1856 American English
3638 The Future Has Already Begun Robert Jungk 1952 Austrian German
3638 So Tender Was Suleyken Siegfried Lenz 1955 German German
3822 Lenin's Tomb David Remnick 1993 American English
3834 Повесть о жизни Konstantin Paustovsky 1956 Russian Russian
3861 The Wrath of the Ancestors Archibald Campbell Jordan 1940 South African English
3881 The River Between Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o 1965 Kenyan English
3953 Λεμονοδάσος Kosmas Politis 1930 Greek Greek
3953 The End Of Our Small Town Dimitris Hatzis 1963 Greek Greek
4073 The Song Of Everlasting Sorrow Wang Anyi 1995 Chinese Chinese
4083 The Manor Isaac Bashevis Singer 1967 Polish Yiddish
4105 Die Schaukel Annette Kolb 1960 German German
4120 Voices In The Evening Natalia Ginzburg 1961 Italian Italian
4131 The Three-Arched Bridge Ismail Kadare 1978 Albanian Albanian
4196 The Master Of Go Yasunari Kawabata 1951 Japanese Japanese
4214 The Beginning of Spring Penelope Fitzgerald 1988 British English
4264 The Town Of N Leonid Dobychin 1935 Russian Russian
4284 A Rose for Emily William Faulkner 1930 American English
4309 The Last September Elizabeth Bowen 1929 Irish English
4527 The Medium Is The Massage Marshall McLuhan 1967 Canadian English
4574 Moominvalley In November Tove Jansson 1970 Finnish Swedish
4609 Here Richard McGuire 2014 American English
4786 Sarah, Plain and Tall Patricia MacLachlan 1985 American English
4850 Peking Story David Kidd 1960 American English
4892 The Short Stories Of Anton Chekhov Anton Chekhov 1886 Russian Russian
4929 The Poorhouse Fair John Updike 1959 American English
5090 Fireflies Shiva Naipaul 1970 Trinidadian English
5093 The Suns of Independence Ahmadou Kourouma 1968 French French
5094 Sartoris William Faulkner 1929 American English
5122 Cold Sassy Tree Olive Ann Burns 1984 American English
5289 Cutting It Short Bohumil Hrabal 1976 Czech Czech
5313 A General Theory Of Oblivion José Eduardo Agualusa 2012 Angolan Portuguese
5348 Collected Stories Of V. S. Pritchett V. S. Pritchett 1982 British English
5427 Hello Summer, Goodbye Michael G. Coney 1975 British English
5443 Egy polgár vallomásai Sandor Marai 1934 Hungarian Hungarian
5446 Imperium Ryszard Kapuscinski 1993 Polish Polish
5619 The Thing About December Donal Ryan 2013 Irish English
5644 Before I Was Born And After My Death Ivailo Petrov 1968 Bulgarian Bulgarian
5665 A Wake For The Living Radmila Lazić 1996 Serbian Serbian
5750 Die Tessinerin Thomas Hürlimann 1981 Swiss German
5780 The Old And The Young Luigi Pirandello 1913 Italian Italian
5852 Works Empedocles -439 Greek Ancient greek
5860 Poems Of John Clare John Clare 1820 British English
5925 Hope in the Dark Rebecca Solnit 2004 American English
5960 This Is Happiness Niall Williams 2019 Irish English
5969 Data From The Decade Of The Sixties Thanassis Valtinos 1989 Greek Greek
6186 Kein Schöner Land Silvio Blatter 1984 Swiss German
6193 Bezzeg Az én Időmben Klára Fehér 1966 Hungarian Hungarian
6261 Shane Jack Schaefer 1949 American English
6282 Earth Abides George Rippey Stewart 1949 American English
6317 The Power Of Habit Charles Duhigg 2012 American English
6438 Who Will Run The Frog Hospital Lorrie Moore 1994 American English
6460 Air Geoff Ryman 2005 British English
6546 Kindheit In Ostpreußen Marion Gräfin Dönhoff 1988 German German