The Greatest Books of All Time on Tradition

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
5979 The Open Door Latifa Zayyat 1960 Egyptian Arabic
5996 After Virtue Alasdair MacIntyre 1981 British English
6002 Batailles Dans La Montagne Jean Giono 1937 French French
6002 Bound To Violence Yambo Ouologuem 1968 Malian French
6002 Note Conjointe Charles Péguy 1914 French French
6089 They Burn the Thistles Yaşar Kemal 1969 Turkish Turkish
6097 The History of Rome Livy -27 Roman Latin
6099 Le Jeune Homme De Sable Williams Sassine 1979 French French
6122 Obabakoak Bernardo Atxaga 1988 Spanish Basque
6186 Kein Schöner Land Silvio Blatter 1984 Swiss German
6193 Bezzeg Az én Időmben Klára Fehér 1966 Hungarian Hungarian
6201 The Earth Émile Zola 1887 French French
6226 Idu Flora Nwapa 1970 Nigerian English
6233 Tar Baby Toni Morrison 1981 American English
6251 The Craftsman Richard Sennett 2008 American English
6270 Cold Nights Ba Jin 1947 Chinese Chinese
6301 A Life Of Her Own Émilie Carles 1977 French French
6331 The Night Watchman Louise Erdrich 2020 American English
6340 The Lost Country Luminița Cioabă 2002 Romanian Unknown
6355 At Twilight They Return Zyranna Zateli 1993 Greek Greek
6415 The Bonesetter's Daughter Amy Tan 2001 American English
6419 Astradeni Eugenia Fakinou 1991 Greek Greek
6444 The Bridge Of Beyond Simone Schwarz-Bart 1972 French French
6460 Air Geoff Ryman 2005 British English
6470 Anthills Of The Savannah Chinua Achebe 1987 Nigerian English
6469 The Day Of Judgment Salvatore Satta 1977 Italian Italian
6485 The Keepers of the House Shirley Ann Grau 1964 American English
6499 Cosima Grazia Deledda 1937 Italian Italian
6546 Heirs To The Great Sinner Sheikh San’on Erkin A’zam 2004 Unknown Unknown
6546 Kindheit In Ostpreußen Marion Gräfin Dönhoff 1988 German German
6551 The Quilts Of Gee's Bend William Arnett, Alvia Wardlaw, Jane Livingston, John Beardsley 2002 American English
6587 The Works Of Johannes Bobrowski Johannes Bobrowski 1969 German German
6604 Pavilion Of Women Pearl S. Buck 1946 American English
6620 Purple Hibiscus Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie 2003 Nigerian English
6627 Csárdás Diane Pearson 1975 British English
6655 A Dream In Polar Fog Yuri Rytkheu 2005 Russian Russian
6675 Three Apples Fell From The Sky Narine Abgaryan 2015 Armenian Russian
6675 The Mountain And The Wall Alisa Ganieva 2015 Russian Russian
6716 Stories of Adalbert Stifter Adalbert Stifter 1801 Austrian German
6735 The Women On The Island Ho Ahn Thai 1991 Vietnamese Vietnamese
6747 The Garlic Ballads Yan Mo 1988 Chinese Chinese
6747 Sturmzeit Charlotte Link 1990 German German
6766 Doña Perfecta Benito Pérez Galdós 1876 Spanish Spanish
6766 The Charles Men Verner von Heidenstam 1897 Swedish Swedish
6766 Sotileza Jose M. de Pereda 1885 Spanish Spanish
6813 La Barraca Vicente Blasco Ibáñez 1898 Spanish Spanish
6855 Ualalapi Ungulani Ba Ka Khosa 1987 Mozambican Portuguese
6864 Wolf Hunt Ivaylo Petrov 1986 Bulgarian Bulgarian
6870 The Mother Grazia Deledda 1920 Italian Italian
6893 Régimódi Történet Szabó, Magda 1977 Hungarian Hungarian
6916 The Paper Menagerie And Other Stories Ken Liu 2016 American English
6939 Shipwrecks Akira Yoshimura 1982 Japanese Japanese
6951 Bones Chenjerai Hove 1988 Zimbabwean English
6964 The Seance and Other Stories Isaac Bashevis Singer 1968 Polish Yiddish
7067 Stories From A Shona Childhood Charles Mungoshi 1989 Zimbabwean English
7139 The Kitchen God's Wife Amy Tan 1991 American English
7141 Jade City Fonda Lee 2017 Chinese English
7177 The Last Harmattan Of Alusine Dunbar Syl Cheney-Choker 1990 Sierra Leonean English
7215 The Island Within Ludwig Lewisohn 1928 American English
7215 Hermann And Dorothea Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1797 German German
7215 Roman Sonnets Giuseppe Gioacchino Belli 1830 Italian Italian
7215 Barbarian Odes Giosué Carducci 1877 Italian Italian
7215 Little Novels Of Sicily Giovanni Verga 1883 Italian Italian
7215 The She Wolf And Other Stories Giovanni Verga 1880 Italian Italian
7215 Atala François-Auguste-René de Chateaubriand 1801 French French
7215 The Entail John Galt 1823 Scottish English
7215 Tales Gottfried Keller 1856 Swiss German
7215 Tales Adalbert Stifter 1840 Austrian German
7215 A Family Chronicle Sergei Aksakov 1856 Russian Russian
7215 Tales Nikolai Leskov 1870 Russian Russian
7215 The Storm Aleksandr Ostrovsky 1860 Russian Russian
7215 Selected Poems Federico García Lorca 1928 Spanish Spanish
7215 Complete Verse Rudyard Kipling 1940 British English
7215 Poems Of Hugh Mac Diarmid Hugh MacDiarmid 1925 Scottish Scots
7215 The Nightingale Sholem Aleichem 1917 Yiddish Yiddish
7215 Poems Of Moshe Leib Halpern Moshe-Leib Halpern 1919 Yiddish Yiddish
7215 Shirot Bialik Hayyim Nahman Bialik 1901 Israeli Hebrew
7215 Twenty One Stories Shmuel Yosef Agnon 1941 Israeli Hebrew
7215 An Egyptian Childhood Taha Husayn 1929 Egyptian Arabic
7215 Poems Of John Crowe Ransom John Crowe Ransom 1923 American English
7215 Vein Of Iron Ellen Glasgow 1935 American English
7215 Samskara U.R. Ananthamurthy 1965 Indian Kannada
7215 The Spider's House Paul Bowles 1955 American English
7215 The Road To The City Natalia Ginzburg 1942 Italian Italian
7215 A Mind At Peace Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar 1949 Turkish Turkish
7215 Lead Us Into Temptation Breandán Ó hEithir 1976 Irish English
7215 Pather Panchali Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay 1929 Indian Bengali
7215 Seasons Of Anomy Wole Soyinka 1973 Nigerian English
7611 Poems Of Léopold S. Senghor Léopold S. Senghor 1945 Senegalese French
7634 The Big Music Kirsty Gunn 2012 New Zealander English
7642 Fiskadoro Denis Johnson 1985 American English
7643 The Hungry Tide Amitav Ghosh 2004 Indian English
7646 Living, Loving And Lying Awake At Night Sindiwe Magona 1991 South African English
7648 Jalna Mazo de La Roche 1927 Canadian English
7662 East Wind Pearl S. Buck 1930 American English
7715 Three Tragedies Federico García Lorca 1947 Spanish Spanish
7794 In My Father's House Anthony Appiah 1992 Ghanaian English
7817 Ties That Bind, Ties That Break Lensey Namioka 1999 American English
7819 Men Of Maize Miguel Angel Asturias 1949 Guatemalan Spanish
7831 Ein Mann Im Haus Ulla Hahn 1996 German German
7849 The Birth House Ami McKay 2006 Canadian English
7907 That Deadman Dance Kim Scott 2010 Australian English
7914 Spring Flowers, Spring Frost Ismail Kadare 2000 Albanian Albanian
7910 The Town William Faulkner 1957 American English
7922 Uprooted Naomi Novik 2015 American English
7940 The Book Of Ebenezer Le Page G. B. Edwards 1981 British English
7949 My Story Kamala Das 1976 Indian English
8026 Among The Believers V. S. Naipaul 1981 British English
8031 An Area Of Darkness V. S. Naipaul 1964 British English
8031 From A Chinese City Gontran de Poncins 1957 French English
8031 Sea And Sardinia D. H. Lawrence 1921 British English
8056 Cutting The Rose Efua Doorkenoo 1994 Ghanaian English
8105 American Indian Stories Zitkala-Sa 1921 American English
8105 The District Governor's Daughters Camilla Collett 1854 Norwegian Norwegian
8105 Letters Of A Javanese Princess Raden Adjeng Kartini 1911 Indonesian Dutch
8105 Islanders Helen R. Hull 1927 American English
8105 Memoirs Of A Korean Queen Lady Hyegyeong 1795 Korean Korean
8105 Memorias De Mama Blanca Teresa de la Parra 1929 Venezuelan Spanish
8105 The Moccasin Maker E. Pauline Johnson 1913 Canadian English
8105 Purple Springs Nellie L. McClung 1921 Canadian English