The Greatest Books of All Time on Education

Click to learn how this list is calculated.

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.

View: List Grid Table
Filter by: Genres Dates Countries

Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
28 Middlemarch George Eliot 1871 British English
29 Jane Eyre Charlotte Brontë 1847 British English
47 David Copperfield Charles Dickens 1849 British English
75 Essays Michel de Montaigne 1580 French French
88 A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man James Joyce 1916 Irish English
116 A Sentimental Education Gustave Flaubert 1869 French French
145 Gargantua and Pantagruel Francois Rabelais 1532 French French
169 The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie Muriel Spark 1961 British, Scottish English
173 A Room of One's Own Virginia Woolf 1929 British English
213 The Counterfeiters André Gide 1925 French French
220 The Republic Plato -379 Greek Ancient greek
244 A Tree Grows in Brooklyn Betty Smith 1943 American English
247 Kim Rudyard Kipling 1901 British English
250 Anne of Green Gables L. M. Montgomery 1908 Canadian English
253 Look Homeward, Angel Thomas Wolfe 1929 American English
275 The Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau Jean-Jacques Rousseau 1782 French French
286 The Once and Future King T. H. White 1958 British English
287 Jude the Obscure Thomas Hardy 1895 British English
305 The Confusions of Young Törless Robert Musil 1906 Austrian German
348 The Glass Bead Game Hermann Hesse 1943 German German
364 White Noise Don DeLillo 1985 American English
377 The Education of Henry Adams Henry Adams 1907 American English
384 Ferdydurke Witold Gombrowicz 1937 Polish Polish
388 The Complete Works of Plato Plato -387 Greek Ancient greek
409 My Brilliant Friend Elena Ferrante 2012 American Italian
414 The Mill on the Floss George Eliot 1860 British English
443 Americanah Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie 2013 Nigerian English
450 Way of All Flesh Samuel Butler 1903 British English
482 Jakob Von Gunten Robert Walser 1909 Swiss German
488 The Shipping News Annie Proulx 1993 Canadian English
520 Mansfield Park Jane Austen 1814 British English
522 The Phantom Tollbooth Norton Juster 1961 American English
557 The Souls of Black Folk W. E. B. Du Bois 1903 American English
605 Claudine Colette 1900 French French
612 Green Henry Gottfried Keller 1855 Swiss German
614 Facundo Domingo Faustino Sarmiento 1845 Argentinian Spanish
621 Analects Confucius -479 Chinese Classical chinese
630 The Swindler Francisco de Quevedo 1626 Spanish Spanish
631 The Bridge of San Luis Rey Thornton Wilder 1927 American English
634 Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance Robert M. Pirsig 1974 American English
640 Black Boy Richard Wright 1945 American English
642 Testament Of Youth Vera Brittain 1933 British English
649 Villette Charlotte Brontë 1853 British English
690 The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin Benjamin Franklin 1791 American English
693 Little House on the Prairie Laura Ingalls Wilder 1935 American English
721 Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1795 German German
735 A Suitable Boy Vikram Seth 1993 Indian English
746 Nervous Conditions Tsitsi Dangarembga 1988 Zimbabwean English
760 Decline and Fall Evelyn Waugh 1928 British English
762 Ballet Shoes Noel Streatfeild 1936 British English
772 The Group Mary McCarthy 1963 American English
774 A Vindication of the Rights of Woman Mary Wollstonecraft 1792 British English
792 A Kestrel for a Knave Barry Hines 1968 British English
818 The African Child Camara Laye 1953 Guinean French
823 The Snowy Day Ezra Jack Keats 1962 American English
837 The Sellout Paul Beatty 2015 American English
867 Heidi Johanna Spyri 1881 Swiss German
874 The Last Samurai Helen DeWitt 2000 American English
881 Utopia Thomas More 1516 British Latin
887 Herland Charlotte Perkins Gilman 1915 American English
906 Up from Slavery Booker T. Washington 1901 American English
913 Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass Frederick Douglass 1845 American English
914 The Yearling Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings 1938 American English
932 The Clouds Aristophanes -423 Greek Ancient greek
933 Lives of Girls and Women Alice Munro 1971 Canadian English
939 Émile Jean-Jacques Rousseau 1762 French French
944 Indian Summer Adalbert Stifter 1857 Austrian German
954 Pygmalion George Bernard Shaw 1913 British English
965 Eminent Victorians Lytton Strachey 1918 British English
980 News from Nowhere William Morris 1890 British English
997 Julie, or the New Heloise Jean-Jacques Rousseau 1761 French French
1008 Professor Unrat Heinrich Mann 1905 German German
1025 Ambiguous Adventure Cheikh Hamidou Kane 1961 Senegalese French
1042 Franny and Zooey J. D. Salinger 1961 American English
1082 The Abolition of Man C. S. Lewis 1943 British English
1097 My Name Is Aram William Saroyan 1940 American English
1120 The Sorrow of Belgium Hugo Claus 1983 Belgian Dutch
1146 Nicholas Nickleby Charles Dickens 1839 British English
1158 Half of a Yellow Sun Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie 2006 Nigerian English
1211 Normal People Sally Rooney 2018 Irish English
1226 The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle Tobias Smollett 1751 British English
1278 So Long a Letter Mariama Bâ 1980 Senegalese French
1307 Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry Mildred D. Taylor 1976 American English
1316 The Fountain Overflows Rebecca West 1956 British English
1319 The Story Of An African Farm Olive Schreiner 1883 South African English
1320 God and Man at Yale William F. Buckley, Jr 1951 American English
1341 The Graduate Charles Webb 1963 American English
1346 Matilda Roald Dahl 1988 British English
1380 The Sword in the Stone T. H. White 1938 British English
1406 The Life of Charlotte Brontë Elizabeth Gaskell 1857 British English
1446 The Tongue Set Free Elias Canetti 1977 Austrian German
1457 Deliver Us Luigi Meneghello 1963 Italian Italian
1536 Rubyfruit Jungle Rita Mae Brown 1973 American English
1552 Waterland Graham Swift 1983 British English
1622 Fortress Besieged Qian Zhongshu 1947 Chinese Chinese
1643 Angela's Ashes Frank McCourt 1996 American English
1662 Down Second Avenue Es'kia Mphahlele 1959 South African English
1671 The Ordeal Of Richard Feverel George Meredith 1859 British English
1733 My Childhood Maxim Gorky 1913 Russian Russian
1751 NW Zadie Smith 2012 British English
1772 Hard Times Charles Dickens 1854 British English
1832 Paradiso José Lezama Lima 1966 Cuban Spanish
1835 Sophie's World Jostein Gaarder 1991 Norwegian Norwegian
1846 Swiss Family Robinson Johann David Wyss 1812 Swiss German
1871 Brief Lives John Aubrey 1898 British English
1878 East Goes West Younghill Kang 1937 American English
1889 Annie John Jamaica Kincaid 1985 Antiguan English
1895 Me Talk Pretty One Day David Sedaris 2000 American English
1902 The Physician Noah Gordon 1986 American English
1913 Mencius Mencius -300 Chinese Classical chinese
1925 The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano Olaudah Equiano 1789 African English
1938 The Spectator Joseph Addison 1711 British English
1992 Headlong Hall Thomas Love Peacock 1816 British English
2004 A School For Fools Sasha Sokolov 1976 Russian Russian
2024 The Chosen Chaim Potok 1967 American English
2048 Amusing Ourselves To Death Neil Postman 1985 American English
2088 Madeline Ludwig Bemelmans 1939 Austrian English
2107 Demon Copperhead Barbara Kingsolver 2022 American English
2121 Julius Caesar William Shakespeare 1623 British English
2131 Seven Brothers Aleksis Kivi 1870 Finnish Finnish