The Greatest Books of All Time on Thought

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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
369 Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus Ludwig Wittgenstein 1921 Austrian German
1297 Poetics Aristotle -322 Greek Greek
2116 Stories of Mr. Keuner Bertolt Brecht 1926 German German
6002 Notebooks Joseph Joubert 1883 French French
6197 Metaphors We Live George Lakoff, Mark Johnson 1980 American English
7860 Language, Thought, And Reality Benjamin Lee Whorf 1956 American English
8259 The Poetry Of Thought George Steiner 2011 British English
9127 Through the Language Glass Guy Deutscher 2010 British English
9631 The Collected Works of Paul Valéry Paul Valéry 1957 French French
14777 Monsieur Teste Paul Valéry 1896 French French
16636 Kleine Weltgeschichte Der Philosophie Hans Joachim Störig 1950 German German
17114 The Cult Of Emptiness The Western Discovery Of Buddhist Thought And The Invention Of Oriental Philosophy Urs App 2012 Swiss English
17114 Labyrinths Of Reason William Poundstone 1988 American English
17114 Surfaces And Essences Douglas Hofstadter 2013 American English
17114 The Ecological Thought Timothy Morton 2010 British English