The Greatest Philosophical 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
6601 A Guide For The Perplexed E. F. Schumacher 1977 British English
6616 The Poetics Of Space Gaston Bachelard 1958 French French
6623 A General Theory Of Love Thomas Lewis 2000 American English
6632 Confessions Jaume Cabré 2011 Spanish Catalan
6637 Journey To The Land Of The Real Victor Segalen 1983 French French
6637 The Ruin Of Kasch Roberto Calasso 1983 Italian Italian
6651 Tratado das Paixões da Alma António Lobo Antunes 1990 Portuguese Portuguese
6661 Mendeleyev's Dream Paul Strathern 2000 British English
6678 The Concept Of Mind Gilbert Ryle 1949 British English
6680 A Fraction Of The Whole Steve Toltz 2008 Australian English
6683 The Opium Of The Intellectuals Raymond Aron 1955 French French
6717 Stories of Adalbert Stifter Adalbert Stifter 1801 Austrian German
6717 Human, All Too Human Friedrich Nietzsche 1878 German German
6717 Track Ernst Bloch 1949 German Unknown
6716 How To Change Your Mind Michael Pollan 2018 American English
6715 The Origin Of Consciousness In The Breakdown Of The Bicameral Mind Julian Jaynes 1976 American English
6717 Anti Goeze Gotthold Ephraim Lessing 1778 German German
6717 On The Aesthetic Education Of Man Friedrich Schiller 1794 German German
6729 The Mysterious Universe James Jeans 1930 British English
6734 The Poverty of Power Barry Commoner 1976 American English
6748 Infanta Bodo Kirchhoff 1990 German German
6762 The World's Illusion Jakob Wassermann 1920 German German
6763 Citizen And Subject Mahmood Mamdani 1996 Ugandan English
6766 Notes Of A Desolate Man Chu Tʽien-wen 1994 Taiwanese Chinese
6795 An Analysis Of The Communist System Milovan Djilas 1957 Serbian Serbo-croatian
6795 Models Of Man, Social And Rational Herbert Simon 1957 American English
6803 On Photography Susan Sontag 1977 American English
6806 America Jean Baudrillard 1986 French French
6811 Écrits Jacques Lacan 1966 French French
6830 Genius Harold Bloom 2002 American English
6832 Rights Talk Mary Ann Glendon 1991 American English
6840 Other Inquisitions Jorge Luis Borges 1952 Argentinian Spanish
6842 Timpul Trăirii, Timpul Mărturisirii. Jurnal Parizian Eugen Simion 2003 Romanian Romanian
6855 Male Daughters, Female Husbands Ifi Amadiume 1987 Nigerian English
6858 Young Man Luther Erik H. Erikson 1958 German English
6860 Meditations On The Tarot Unknown 1980 Unknown French
6860 The Thirteen Petalled Rose Adin Steinsaltz 1980 Israeli Hebrew
6873 Love's Work Gillian Rose 1995 British English
6873 Povedal Mi Veštec Tiziano Terzani 2002 Italian Italian
6878 Lettres Aux Années De Nostalgie Kenzaburō Ōe 1987 Japanese Japanese
6899 Exhalation Ted Chiang 2019 American English
6900 오월의 사회과학 최정운 1997 Korean Korean
6919 S.C.U.M. Manifesto Valerie Solanas 1967 American English
6922 Necropolitics Achille Mbembe 2003 French French
6929 Jayber Crow Wendell Berry 2000 American English
6931 Duck, Death And The Tulip Wolf Erlbruch 2007 German German
6943 La Poupée Russe Gheorghe Crăciun 2004 Romanian Unknown
6948 The Fantastic In Literature Eric S. Rabkin 1976 American English
6951 The Invention Of Africa V. Y. Mudimbe 1988 Congolese English
6954 Kindly Inquisitors Jonathan Rauch 1993 American English
6969 Six Studies In Communism Arthur Koestler, Richard Crossman 1960 Multiple English
6969 The End Of Ideology Daniel Bell 1960 American English
6969 Collected Shorter Poems W. H. Auden 1966 British English
6992 Hallucinating Foucault Patricia Duncker 1996 British English
6996 Panegyric Guy Debord 1989 French French
7002 Fantasy Rosemary Jackson 1981 British English
7019 Corinne Madame de Staël 1807 French French
7022 Crito Plato -389 Greek Ancient greek
7025 Precarious Life Judith Butler 2004 American English
7025 The Fabric Of The Cosmos Brian Greene 2004 American English
7030 The Glory Of The Lord Hans Urs Von Balthasar 1982 Swiss German
7034 Democracy And Power In An American City Robert Dahl 1961 American English
7034 Madness And Civilization Michel Foucault 1961 French French
7034 The Politics Of Cultural Despair Fritz Stern 1961 American English
7043 The Cosmic Connection Carl Sagan 1973 American English
7056 Kaddish For An Unborn Child Imre Kertész 1990 Hungarian Hungarian
7071 E=Mc2 David Bodanis 2000 British English
7081 Hermina Sami Tchak 2003 French French
7083 The Art of the Soluble Peter B. Medawar 1967 British English
7093 Small Gods Terry Pratchett 1992 British English
7095 Economic Backwardness in Historical Perspective Alexander Gerschenkron 1962 American English
7098 Gli Imperdonabili Cristina Campo 1987 Italian Italian
7101 The Glenn Gould Reader Glenn Gould 1984 Canadian English
7106 Technopoly Neil Postman 1992 American English
7133 Desolation Angels Jack Kerouac 1965 American English
7134 Slow Man J. M. Coetzee 2005 South African English
7153 Poems Adrienne Rich 1975 American English
7160 The Poems Of Manolis Anagnostakis Manolis Anagnostakis 2001 Greek Greek
7162 Blind Argus Or The Fables Of The Memory Gesualdo Bufalino 1988 Italian Italian
7165 A Fable William Faulkner 1954 American English
7194 Social Theory And Social Structure Robert K. Merton 1949 American English
7199 The Language Of The Night Ursula K. Le Guin 1979 American English
7205 Voroshilovgrad Serhiy Zhadan 2010 Ukrainian Ukrainian
7215 The Lisbon Earthquake Voltaire 1756 French French
7215 On The Historical Novel Alessandro Manzoni 1800 Italian Italian
7215 The Red Notebook Benjamin Constant 1804 French French
7215 On Love Stendhal 1822 French French
7215 Imaginary Conversations Walter Savage Landor 1824 British English
7215 Eureka Edgar Allan Poe 1848 American English
7215 Samskara U.R. Ananthamurthy 1965 Indian Kannada
7571 The Conformist Alberto Moravia 1951 Italian Italian
7576 The Racial Contract Charles W. Mills 1997 American English
7582 Animal Liberation Peter Singer 1975 Australian English
7596 Fairy Tales And The Act Of Subversion Jack Zipes 1983 American English
7602 The Beginning Of Infinity David Deutsch 2011 British English
7605 Writing Marguerite Duras 1993 French French
7615 The Heretic Miguel Delibes 1998 Spanish Spanish
7625 Caietul Albastru Nicolae Balotă 2007 Romanian Romanian
7640 The Literature Of Terror David Punter 1980 British English
7644 Fantasy And Mimesis Kathryn Hume 1984 American English
7645 All About Love bell hooks 2000 American English
7663 Against Interpretation Susan Sontag 1966 American English
7666 The Age Of Wonder Richard Holmes 2008 British English
7676 The Soft Side Henry James 1900 British English
7677 Darwin's Black Box Michael J. Behe 1996 American English
7723 Purity And Danger Mary Douglas 1966 British English
7747 The Structure Of Social Action Talcott Parsons 1937 American English
7750 Critical Mass Philip Ball 2004 British English
7751 The Age of Surveillance Capitalism Shoshana Zuboff 2019 American English
7762 The Collected Stories of Heinrich Boll Heinrich Böll 1972 German German
7765 In Search of Klingsor Jorge Volpi Escalante 1999 Mexican Spanish
7784 Close To The Machine Ellen Ullman 1997 American English
7789 The Mind and Society Vilfredo Pareto 1916 Italian Italian
7794 The Rebel Angels Robertson Davies 1981 Canadian English
7793 The Gay Science Friedrich Nietzsche 1882 German German
7795 In My Father's House Anthony Appiah 1992 Ghanaian English
7811 The Elegance of the Hedgehog Muriel Barbery 2006 French French
7811 The Marriage Plot Jeffrey Eugenides 2011 American English
7836 The Midnight Library Matt Haig 2020 British English
7847 The Aesthetics Of Fantasy Literature And Art Roger Schlobin 1982 American English