LitNet Top 100 Books Revisited

[Desolation]

We're going to be doing a revision of the current Top 100 Books list, in order to reflect changing tastes and membership. Also, because lists are fun.

So, here's how it will go. Post a list of your 10 favorite books (or, if necessary, the 10 books you think are most deserving of being on the list), in order of preference. Order is very important, as I will be using a weighted point system to compile the final list. The book that you rank as #1 will receive 10 points, and the book you rank at #10 will receive 1 point, and so on and so forth.

To give everyone plenty of time, I'm going to leave voting open until around mid/late December (after finals end, basically). If at any point you would like to edit your ballot, simply post a new one with a note to make your edit clear, and I will discard the previous ballot.

A user should have at least 50 posts to submit choices. I don't want new members to feel excluded, but this arrangement ensures that the list remains a community project.

So, have fun and be respectful of other members' choices (though, as always, discussion and debate, if it comes up, is encouraged). Thank you!

[Desolation]

My ballot -

1. Ulysses by James Joyce
2. The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
3. The Recognitions by William Gaddis
4. In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust
5. Three Novels: Molloy, Malone Dies, The Unnameable by Samuel Beckett (Just a note here – if they are usually published in a single book, I’m going to count votes for collections of novels, short stories, and poems such as this)
6. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky
7. A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
8. Journey to the End of the Night by Louis-Ferdinand Celine
9. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce
10. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

[Darcy88]

1. Don Quixote
2. One Hundred Years of Solitude
3. Heart of Darkness
4. Blood Meridian
5. Tropic of Cancer
6. The Iliad
7. The Plague
8. The Idiot
9. Wuthering Heights
10. Lady Chatterly's Lover

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

1. Moby Dick by Herman Melville
2. The Bible by ANONYMOUS
3. Paradise Lost by Milton
4.The Comedia by Dante
5. The Aeneid by Virgil
6. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
7. The Odyessey by Homer
8. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
9. Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy
10. Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien

[Anton Hermes]

(Just a note here – if they are usually published in a single book, I’m going to count votes for collections of novels, short stories, and poems such as this)

I like your picks. But I've never seen A la Recherche du Temps Perdu published as a single book.

[Lykren]

Ulysses
The Tale of Genji
Anna Karenina
The Brothers Karamazov
Moby Dick
Pride and Prejudice
Hamlet
The Stranger
Paradise Lost
Middlemarch

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Darcy! Good to see ya!

Also, desolation, you may want to add the provision that one needs to have at least 50 votes before they can submit choices.

[Desolation]

I like your picks. But I've never seen A la Recherche du Temps Perdu published as a single book.

That's a fair point...And that would be one hell of a monstrous book...But it is generally considered to be one novel cut into several volumes.

I figure series, like Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and the like, should be counted as one as well.


Also, desolation, you may want to add the provision that one needs to have at least 50 votes before they can submit choices.

Good idea.

[Calidore]

I figure series, like Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and the like, should be counted as one as well.


LOTR was written as one novel; the publisher split it up. Harry Potter was written as individual novels of varying quality. Also, in general it seems like you'll be opening a can of worms if you allow entire series as single entries.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Yeah, especially when you're talking about a series with 10-15+ books (not that I think many of those would be nominated, but you never know). Maybe the criteria should be if it's intended to be one work, such as Search of Lost Time and LOTR?

[Anton Hermes]

That's a fair point...And that would be one hell of a monstrous book...But it is generally considered to be one novel cut into several volumes.

Very much so. Like a lot of Lawrence Durrell's novels, they don't work well without the other books in the series. But it's a real poser how to deal with them for lists like these (in which I never seem able to participate).

[Desolation]

I don't want to split too many hairs as far as what voters can and can't nominate as a single entry. I leave it mostly to each voter's discretion.

(Besides, it really would be tidier to count a vote for the entire Harry Potter series than for each of the separate novels.)

[stlukesguild]

1. Comedia- Dante Alighieri
2. The Bible- anon.
3. The Oresteia- Aeschylus
4. Hamlet- William Shakespeare
5. Don Quixote- Cervantes
6. Shahnameh- Ferdowsi
7. The Arabian Nights- anon.
8. Les Fleurs du mal- Charles Baudelaire
9. Labyrinths- J.L. Borges
10. King Lear- William Shakespeare

[Clopin]

1. The bible - JESUS
2. The Brothers Karamazov - Dostoyevsky
3. Comedia - Dante
4. Confessions - Rousseau
5. War and Peace - Tolstoy
6. Crime and Punishment - Dostoyevsky
7. Les Miserables - Hugo
8. Don Quixote - Cervantes
9. Complete works of Shakespeare (does this count?) - Shakespeare
10. In Search of Lost Time - Proust

Not really in any order.

[Desolation]

9. Complete works of Shakespeare (does this count?)

I'll take it. But, it should be noted that, as with any anthology where the individual works contained therein are more well-known, it's less likely to make the final list than one of Shakespeare's play may be.

[ChicagoReader]

1. The Great Gatsby - Fitzgerald
2. Lolita - Nabokov
3. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Twain
4. Death of a Salesman - Miller
5. Moby-Dick - Melville
6. Blood Meridian - McCarthy
7. The Brothers Karamazov - Dostoevsky
8. Heart of Darkness - Conrad
9. The Complete Stories - Kafka
10. For Whom the Bell Tolls - Hemingway

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Alright, I need to revise my choices (I'm also going to edit the first list so it's constant) because I'm seeing all these books I didn't think of the first time:

1. Moby Dick by Herman Melville
2. The Bible by ANONYMOUS
3. Paradise Lost by Milton
4.The Comedia by Dante
5. The Aeneid by Virgil
6. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
7. The Odyessey by Homer
8. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
9. Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy
10. Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien

[Dark Muse]

1. The Magus by John Fowles
2. No Exit by Jean-Paul Sartre
3. The Stranger by Camus
4. The Odyssey by Homer
5. Paradise Lost by Milton
6. The Canterbury Tales by Chaucer
7. Dracula by Bram Stoker
8. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
9. Emma by Jane Austen
10. The Sun Also Rises by Hemingway

[My2cents]

1. Hamlet Shakespeare
2. Paradise Lost Milton
3. Essays Montaigne
4. Eugene Onegin Pushkin
5. In Search of Lost Time Proust
6. Ulysses Joyce
7. Walden Thoreau
8. Lolita Nabokov
9. One Hundred Years of Solitude Garcia Marquez
10. Tender Is The Night Fitzgerald

[Pierre Menard]

1. Fictions - Jorge Luis Borges
2. Waiting For Godot- Samuel Beckett
3. Leaves Of Grass - Walt Whitman
4. Julius Caesar - Shakespeare
5. The Book of Disquiet - Fernando Pessoa
6. Suttree - Cormac McCarthy
7. Pale Fire - Vladimir Nabokov
8. The Iliad - Homer
9. Dubliners - James Joyce
10.Essays - Montaigne

[Clopin]

This already looks like a much better list than the first one.

[Scheherazade]

Based on my own enjoyment of the books:


1. To Kill A Mockingbird

2. Tales of Decameron

3. Grapes of Wrath

4. Pygmalion

5. Lolita

6. Winter of Our Discontent

7. Tender is the Night

8. Three Men in a Boat

9. The Collector

10. The Crucible

[mortalterror]

1. Comedia (Divine Comedy)- Dante Alighieri
2. The Bible- anon.
3.The Illiad- Homer
4. The Oresteia- Aeschylus
5. Hamlet- William Shakespeare
6. Shahnameh- Ferdowsi
7. The Metamorphoses- Ovid
8. Bhagavadgita- Vyasa
9. Les Fleurs du mal- Charles Baudelaire
10. Poems of Rumi

[OrphanPip]

I will cut someone if there is no Austen in the top 10.

1. Emma by Jane Austen
2. Hamlet by Shakespeare
3. The Glass Menagerie by T. Williams
4. If on a winter's night a traveler by Italo Calvino
5. Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
6. On Liberty by John Stuart Mill
7. Phèdre by Jean Racine
8. The Bible
9. Orlando Furioso by Ariosto
10. The Lyrical Ballads - Wordsworth and Coleridge

Just to explain my somewhat eclectic list. I decided to nominate a certain amount from an array of select genres. So, I picked 2 novels, 3 plays (since theater is my preferred genre), 2 collections of lyric poetry, 1 epic, 1 non-fiction book, and 1 religious classic.

Quite by coincidence I've also managed to provide 2 nominations from the 20th century, 2 from the 19th, 1 just barely in the 18th, 1 from the 17th, 2 Renaissance works and then the Bible.

[The Comedian]

1. Walden, Thoreau
2. Gulliver's Travels, Swift
3. The Odyssey, Homer
4. Moby-Dick, Melville
5. The Divine Comedy, Dante
6. Watership Down, Adams
7. The Orestia, Aeschylus
8. My Antoina, Cather
9. The Picture of Dorian Grey, Wilde
10. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Stevenson

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Very much so. Like a lot of Lawrence Durrell's novels, they don't work well without the other books in the series. But it's a real poser how to deal with them for lists like these (in which I never seem able to participate).

Why can't you participate?

[mona amon]

I'm really not too sure about the order, but anyway -

1. The Bible
2. Don Quixote - Cervantes
3. Hamlet - Shakespeare
4. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
5. Ulysses - James Joyce
6. The Tale of Genji - Murasaki Shikibu
7. Emma - Jane Austen
8. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Twain
9. Lolita - Vladimir Nabakov
10. Villette - Charlotte Bronte

[ZTay]

(This list is both a product of my limited reading and my limited memory.)

1. The Holy Bible (People say: it's the Bible of _____. But THIS is the Bible of Bibles!)
2. War and Peace by Tolstoy
3. Brothers Karamazov by Dostoyevsky
4. Ulysses by Joyce
5. Tusculan Dispuations by Cicero
6. Confessions by St. Augustine
7. Gutenberg Galaxy by Macluhan
8. Discourse On Method by Descartes
9. Great Gatsby by Fitzgerald
10. The Republic by Plato

[Lykren]

6. The Tale of Genji - Murasaki Shikibu


Glad to see this, and hope to see a few more votes for Genji!

[mona amon]

It's a wonderful book, isn't it? I loved it, and to think what a lot must have been lost in translation!

[RicMisc]

Oh, I'm so bad at making a list out of the books I like. But I'll give it a try..

1. The Great Gatsby - Fitzgerald
2. La Divina Commedia - Dante
3. Hamlet - Shakespeare
4. To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee
5. The Decameron - Boccaccio
6. The Odyssey - Homer
7. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
8. The Bible
9. Ab Urbe Condita - Titus Livius
10. The Lord of the Rings

[wordeater]

1. The Brothers Karamazov - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
2. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
3. A Tale of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
4. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd - Agatha Christie
5. Tess of the d'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
6. Wuthering Heights - Emily Brontë
7. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
8. The Quiet American - Graham Greene
9. 1984 - George Orwell
10. Death in Venice (Der Tod in Venedig) - Thomas Mann

[Heteronym]

1) War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
2) Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoevsky
3) The Gospel According to Jesus Christ, José Saramago
4) One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez
5) The Baron in the Trees, Italo Calvino
6) The Master and Margarita, Mikhail Bulgakov
7) The Castle, Franz Kafka
8) The Odyssey, Homer
9) The Maias, Eça de Queiroz
10) Madame Bovary, Gustave Flaubert

[Desolation]

We've already made it to over 100 entries. :cornut:

Here's the Top 5 as of right now:
1. The Bible
2. Hamlet
3. The Divine Comedy
4. Ulysses
5. The Brothers Karamazov

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

That's a good top 5. If Moby Dick isn't in the top 20, though, I'll flip out.

[Desolation]

I doubt that you'll be disappointed. It was in the top 5 until this morning, actually.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Good.

[Drkshadow03]

1. The Bible
2. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
3. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
4. Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
5. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
6. The Odyssey by Homer
7. Crime and Punishment by Fydor Dostoevsky
8. Othello by William Shakespeare
9. Bleak House by Charles Dickens
10. Hamlet by William Shakespeare.

[kev67]

1. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkein
2. Watership Down - Richard Adams
3. Lonesome Dove - Larry McMurtry
4. Dance to the Music of Time - Anthony Powell
5. I Claudius - Rupert Graves
6. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
7. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
8. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
9. The Jungle Books - Rudyard Kipling
10. Mr American - George Fraser MacDonald

The first two were my favourites as a child. Lonesome Dove was a series of four books and I actually prefer the prequel, Dead Man's Walk. Dance to the Music of Time is a series of twelve books, similar to La Recherche du Temps Perdu. I Claudius has a sequel, Claudius the God. Hitchhiker's Guide is also a series, but I only like the first book.

[kelby_lake]

Anna Karenina- Leo Tolstoy
Vanity Fair- William Thackerey
Far From The Madding Crowd- Thomas Hardy
Tess of The D'Urbervilles- Thomas Hardy
The Great Gatsby- F Scott Fitzgerald
Tender is The Night- F Scott Fitzgerald
The Complete Works of Shakespeare (okay, it's a bit of a cheat but otherwise my list would be full of Shakespeare)
The Secret Garden- Frances Hodgen Burnett
Little Women- Louisa May Alcott
Sons and Lovers- DH Lawrence

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

It's funny how little diversity are on some lists (and this is not in referenc rot kelby's post above). I'm not saying this is bad, as this is essentially just a "name your favorite books" list, just an interesting observation. My list isn't that diverse, either, really.

[Alexander III]

It's funny how little diversity are on some lists (and this is not in referenc rot kelby's post above). I'm not saying this is bad, as this is essentially just a "name your favorite books" list, just an interesting observation. My list isn't that diverse, either, really.

But should it be diverse? I mean as an European I feel almost what may be called a sense of duty in regard to european literature; unlike persian, chinese or south american literature; it is my literature it is the literature of my history and my peoples and there is a sense of preserving my literature. After all while erudition is always a virtue, one should not forget that the literature of ones people should hold a prominent position in ones heart. This may be seen as a nationalistic sentiment, but for me it is more like one is naturally more inclined to want to know of the history of ones family, as there is a sense of thisness which the history of another family does not posses.

[Pierre Menard]

It's funny how little diversity are on some lists (and this is not in referenc rot kelby's post above). I'm not saying this is bad, as this is essentially just a "name your favorite books" list, just an interesting observation. My list isn't that diverse, either, really.



I tossed up whether or not to do a 'favourites' list or to add mostly books I feel are of sheer importance. I ended up leaning more to a 'favourites' just because it was a little easier to narrow down. I guess it'd be kinda cool just to see the forums general taste and so on.

[Paulclem]

I don't see why not. Versed as I have been in English literature, I've branched out into the literature of other countries. I find it illuminating and interesting, but I am aware that I am sadly lacking in knowledge of many countries' contributions - including the US.

I think your view is nationalistic - and I don't see that as negative in the context of literature - but why limit the scope? And where would you draw the line? We can have the Russians ans the US, but not South American writers? Why not? Europeans developed the novel and football. We're all to thethe good for the form and the game spreading all over the world.

I do agree with Mutatis though. They do look a bit, my list is better and more academically impressive than your list. Perhaps I'm wrong, but is there a bit of that going on?:D

I haven't posted a list because mine's small and unimpressive.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

But should it be diverse? I mean as an European I feel almost what may be called a sense of duty in regard to european literature; unlike persian, chinese or south american literature; it is my literature it is the literature of my history and my peoples and there is a sense of preserving my literature. After all while erudition is always a virtue, one should not forget that the literature of ones people should hold a prominent position in ones heart. This may be seen as a nationalistic sentiment, but for me it is more like one is naturally more inclined to want to know of the history of ones family, as there is a sense of thisness which the history of another family does not posses.
A list shouldn't be diverse if its disenginious to make it so (i.e., making it a "Oh yeah, well look at my list--it has ancient Greeks, Italians, and Asian writers on it!). If your list is based in what you like best and all your favorite books are from one culture, I see nothing wrong with that . . . beyond the reader probably needing to expand their horizons a bit.

I tossed up whether or not to do a 'favourites' list or to add mostly books I feel are of sheer importance. I ended up leaning more to a 'favourites' just because it was a little easier to narrow down. I guess it'd be kinda cool just to see the forums general taste and so on.
I did a bit of both. I've never read more than small bits and pieces of The Bible, but there's no doubt in my mind that it's the most important piece of literature ever written (and even being an atheist, I'm showing my bias here by including the bible and not the Koran or Torah). Actually, aside from a few choices (Moby Dick, Heart of Darkness, and Lolita) my list is comprised of books I recognize for their importance, more that me basing my list on pure enjoyment. If I did my list on pure enjoyment--the books that have entertained me the most--I'd have Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire, Ender's Game, and a couple Stephen King books on there. Those just don't deserve to be on this list, though (IMO).



I do agree with Mutatis though. They do look a bit, my list is better and more academically impressive than your list. Perhaps I'm wrong, but is there a bit of that going on?:D
Well, I think there's always a bit of literary "mine's bigger" competition here on LitNet. :D I think most are genuine, though--at least the lists are consistent with what people have been saying on here for years.


I haven't posted a list because mine's small and unimpressive.
Oh, come on! Post it.

[Scheherazade]

I haven't posted a list because mine's small and unimpressive.But, does size matter?

[Paulclem]

I did a bit of both. I've never read more than small bits and pieces of The Bible, but there's no doubt in my mind that it's the most important piece of literature ever written (and even being an atheist, I'm showing my bias here by including the bible and not the Koran or Torah). Actually, aside from a few choices (Moby Dick, Heart of Darkness, and Lolita) my list is comprised of books I recognize for their importance, more that me basing my list on pure enjoyment. If I did my list on pure enjoyment--the books that have entertained me the most--I'd have Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire, Ender's Game, and a couple Stephen King books on there. Those just don't deserve to be on this list, though (IMO).

Well, I think there's always a bit of literary "mine's bigger" competition here on LitNet. :D I think most are genuine, though--at least the lists are consistent with what people have been saying on here for years.


Oh, come on! Post it.

:D Non.

I'm not sure o what basis an individual should base their list. Is it an "I think this should go on here list" or "I enjoyed it/ got a lot out of it/ enjoyed studying it" list.

I'm also a terrible procrastinator when chosing books, though I usually enjoy what I choose in the end.


But, does size matter?

I'd say not, but with my enfeebled list I would. :D

[Desolation]

It's funny that this topic's coming up, because I really wanted to throw in a little note in my original post begging people to "Please Be Biased."

If all of your favorite books come from on country, city, time period, or even one author, I don't see why you should feel like throwing in books from other settings for diversity's sake. No one should feel that what they really like isn't good or important enough.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I disagree. I like a lot of crap . . . doesn't necessarily mean I think it should go in a "tops" list, haha.

[OrphanPip]

I picked my list almost completely on the basis of stuff I like. I'm actually reasonably sure I don't think Orlando furioso is more important than The Iliad, but it does have hippogriffs, a moon voyage, and a lesbian.

[Pierre Menard]

I picked my list almost completely on the basis of stuff I like. I'm actually reasonably sure I don't think Orlando furioso is more important than The Iliad, but it does have hippogriffs, a moon voyage, and a lesbian.


I'm sold!

[Miserio]

1. El Aleph - J.L. Borges
2. 100 years of solitude - García Marquez
3. Adventures of Huck Finn - Mark Twain
4. The Sun Also Rises - Hemingway.
5. Othello - Shakespeare
6. La divina comedia - Dante
7. Ulysses - Joyce
8. Voices - Antonio Porchia.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

So, when will the final list be settled on? I was wondering who all has made their picks, and made a list of them:

Desolation
Darcy88
Mutatis-Mutandis
Lykren
stlukesguild
Clopin
ChicagoReader
Dark Muse
My2Cenfs
Pierre Menard
Scheherazade
mortalterror
OrphanPip
The Comedian
mona amon
ZTay
RicMisc
Wordeater
Heteronym
Drkshadow03
kev67
kelby_lake
Miserio (one and only post, don't know if it should be counted)

So, after a look, that's a good number of the forum's active members. I only went through the thread once, so I may have missed some. I think we should try and get the following heavy hitters' choices before the final list is compiled:

JBI
Alexander III (he commented, but never made a list)
Paulclem (he refuses, but he's definitely a valued member of the forum)
JuniperWoolf (hasn't been active lately--I think she just moved--but her voice should definitely be heard)
BienvenuJDC
PeterL
mal4mac
Dfloyd
Logos
qimissung
Admin (he owns the dang forum, for goodness sake)
MarkBastable (also not active much anymore, but still pops in from time to time)
hillwalker
miyako
Delta

I know there's a few I can't think off that should be on that list. If I didn't name someone, it was t intentionally (as there're a few people there I don't particularly get along with . . . even one who has me on his ignore list :lol:, so someone else will have to ask PererL for his picks).

[qimissung]

I just saw this thread. I love lists! I'll try to make one up here in the next week or so.

[Desolation]

So, when will the final list be settled on?

I'm planning on leaving it open until some time in December, to give those and other members time to (hopefully) make their lists.

But, it can be left open for as long (or as little) as necessary.

[Mr.lucifer]

Good luck with JBI, he almost never mentions what he likes.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Good luck with JBI, he almost never mentions what he likes.

I'm sure if we were making a list involving what one dislikes, he'd jump right in. He's rarely shy about sharing that. :lol:

[Alexander III]

1 - War And Peace (Tolstoy)
2 - The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)
3 - Eugene Onegin (Pushkin)
4 -Marcus Aurelius (Meditations)
5 - Mémoires d'Outre-Tombe (Chateaubriand)
6 - Ana Karenina (Tolstoy)
7 - A Farewell To Arms (Hemingway)
8 - Tale Of Genji (Murasaki)
9 - The Satyricon (Petronius)
10 -David Copperfield (Charles Dickens)

[MarkBastable]

A Christmas Carol - Chuck Dickens
Fifth Business - Rob Davies
Tristram Shandy - Lol Sterne
Portnoy's Complaint - Phil Roth
The Canterbury Tales - Jeff Chaucer
The Diary of a Madman - Nick Gogol
Leave it to Psmith - Plum Wodehouse
The Dancers at the End of Time - Micky Moorcock
Lolita - Vlad Nabokov
Success - Mart Amis

[Admin]

Of the books on my site I'd put Gatsby at #1, Odyssey at 2. I think I like The Odyssey because of all the little clever things. Gatsby is just well written. I also like 1984.

I saw Mutadis say he was doing things important, but did not include Martin because he liked it but... it isn't important? I think in 100 years people will be reading A Song of Ice and Fire. Things of commercial success today are not disqualified from the annals of literature in my opinion. A list of important books, how could we leave off Harry Potter, which inspired hundreds of millions of people to read?

1. A Game of Thrones (Or a Song of Ice and Fire)
2. The Great Gatsby
3. Atlas Shrugged
4. The Lord of the Rings (The Return of the King)
5. Jurassic Park
6. Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (or the whole thing, but #6 is the best)
7. The Odyssey
8. Ender's Game
9. 1984
10. Starship Troopers

I'm not as well read as most of you, and obviously favor Sci/fi Fantasy.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Good list, nonetheless.

[namenlose]

1. Commedia - Dante Alighieri
2. Don Quixote - Miguel de Cervantes
3. A Dream of Red Mansions - Cao Xueqin
4. I Canti - Giacomo Leopardi
5. The Flowers of Evil - Charles Baudelaire
6. In Search of Lost Time - Marcel Proust
7. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
8. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
9. The Shahnameh - Ferdowsi
10. King Lear - William Shakespeare

I've edited my list and replaced Kafka's Complete Stories with Madame Bovary, which is also among my favorites and in my opinion stands out better as a single and cohesive work. Since its absence in a list of books would be worse in my opinion than the omission of any of Kafka's works, I thought it would be better to do so. As my list was one of the last added and only one of my choices was changed, I decided not to make another post.

[ennison]

Here's tuppensworth

Voss
Life and Fate
The Inheritors
Child of God
The Arrow of Gold
The Night Before we Sailed
The Channering Worm
Crusoe's Daughter
Book of Job
The Book of Ebenezer le Page

Agus oidhche Mhath!

[Eiseabhal]

I've just joined this forum. I didn't expect to find a Ghaidhlig speaker here. Is that The Night Before We Sailed by AP Campbell? I'm sure he would be delighted if it was.

[Eiseabhal]

I thought you might have replied by now ennison but looking at your book list I think I know them all and they are very good. I'll offer a short list too before signing off for the night. I make no great claims for these only that they are good.

Uttermost Part of The Earth - E L Bridges
A Voice Through a Cloud - Denton Welch
Tree of Man - P White (Same author as Voss posted by Ennison above. Although Voss is a great book in every way, Tree of Man is even better)
The Friendly Ones - J Littel (Amazing and moral in a way that is hard to attack)
Nostromo - JC (Probably blasphemous to refer to him just by his initials)
The Erl King - M Tournier
Hermanos - Herrick (Little recognised American)
The Adventures of Private Chonkin - Voinovich
Cancer Ward - Solzenitsyn
A suathadh ri iomadh rubha - Campbell ( Not yet translated. Maybe I'll do it)

[Gregory Samsa]

1, Crime and Punishment
2, The Stranger
3, Of Mice and Men
4, 2666
5, In Search of Lost Time
6, Slaughterhouse-Five
7, Perfume: The Story of a Murderer
8, The Unbearable Lightness of Being
9, The Great Gatsby
10, The Catcher in the Rye

[hawthorns]

1. Remembrance of Things Past--Proust
2. Crime and Punishment--Dostoyevsky
3. The Flowers of Evil--Baudelaire
4. Hamlet--Shakespeare
5. The Worst Journey in the World--Shakleton
6. The Trial--Kafka
7. The Sound and the Fury--Faulkner
8. Invisible Cities--Calvino
9. Brideshead Revisited--Waugh
10. Villette--Bronte

[B. Laumness]

1. Also Sprach Zarathustra, Nietzsche
2. Hamlet, Shakespeare
3. Essais, Montaigne
4. Les Fleurs du Mal, Baudelaire
5. Iliad, Homer
6. Zibaldone, Leopardi
7. Oedipus the King, Sophocles
8. The Castle, Kafka
9. Les Misérables, Hugo
10. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë

[Eiseabhal]

Here is another group of very readable books

Titus Groan - Peake
The Tin Drum - Grass (Even if the bastard was an SS sojerboy)
The Unforgotten Prisoner - RC Hutchinson (Only the greatest mid century English novelist)
The House of The Solitary Maggot - Purdy (A cracking and odd writer)
Saoghal an Treobhaiche - Fantastic oral history
A Journey Round my Skull - This is not just a Hungarian classic, it's a European classic - Karinthy
Highland River - Gunn
The Fox in the Attic - Hughes - better known for A High Wind in Jamaica
The Heart of Midlothian - Scott (The dialogue in this is brilliant)
The Screwtape Letters - Lewis
The Kon-tiki Expedition - Heyerdhal (Well there is content and observation and interest. I could just as easily have put in Haston or O Dowd or Moitessier)

The short stories of Kipling and of John Cheever are also very very good

[Eiseabhal]

I think I made an error by not naming the authors of the above. I'll try to rectify that but it takes a bit for one my age to get to grips with the intricacies of a too busy page. Yeah ok boring but I've read twenty times as much as most of the youthful contributors here so be bleeding patient.

Ok That's it done I think. Dean thusa e cuideachd Ennison!

[ennison]

Tha mi a smaoineachadh g bhaile Ghaidhlig agad Eiseabhal. I was banned That's why I didn't reply. Chanel iad ag iarraidh an fhirinn ann a sheo. I will undoubtedly be banned again. I see your list. I agree that I should have added author's names. Let me think about your list before I reply.

[ladderandbucket]

Montaigne - Essays
Melville - Moby Dick
King James Bible - Ecclesiastes
Schopenhauer - World as Will and Representation
Sophocles - Oedipus the king
Tolstoy - Death of Ivan Ilyich
Mccarthy - Blood Meridian
Shakespeare - Macbeth
Conrad - Heart of Darkness
Robinson Jeffers - Selected Poetry of Robinson Jeffers

[Greenazure]

1 The Story of the Stone Cao Xueqin
2 Naked Lunch
3 Ulysses
4 Cosmicomics Italo Calvino
5 Shanhai Ching
6 Tao Te Ching Laotze
7 Les Fleurs du mal
8 One Hundred Years of Solitude
9 Sound and Fury
10 Kama Sutra

[katow]

1- Brothers Karamazov by Dostoyesvky
2- Notes from the underground by Dostoyesky
3- Trial by F.Kafka
4- Man´s Fate ( Condition Humanine) by Malraux
5- Crime and punishment by Dostoyevsky
6- If This Is a Man by Primo Levi
7- 1984 - Orwell
8- The Stranger by A.Camus
9- Death of Ivan Ilyich by Tolstoy
10- Stories by Kafka (In the Penal Colony,A Hunger Artist,The Metamorphosis, etc...)

This is my list, but lot of books could be on it, Dorian Gray, Godot, Idiot, Demons, dead souls, The overcoat, Hamlet, Macbeth, King Lear, Othelo, Animal Farm, Brave New world, Book of Disquiet by Pessoa etc...

Reading Hunger by Knut Hamsun

[ennison]

I have thought a little about your list. Peake was a brilliant writer . I know that I enjoyed the first two of the Gormenghast trilogy. The last is rather grim and dark and although the language is still full of beauty there is less light, less joy but of course he was seriously ill by then. As far as Grass is concerned there is a definite phantasmagoric fertility of imagination. I'm not sure I'd enjoy him now. Don't know if I will try him again though I have The FLounder and a couple of others sitting unread on the shelf. I think I would agree about Hutchinson . He is undeservedly neglected. He likes his characters but his chronological control doesn't always seem good. That is definitely true of Joanna at Daybreak which is otherwise a very very good novel. I'm afraid I don't know the novel by Purdy so I'd better not comment. I read Malcolm years ago. Odd book.

[ennison]

I would be lying if I said that I'd ever heard of Karinthy. Saoghal an Treobhaiche is very hard to find. The English translation that I read was ok but the fluent idiomatic language element was lost. Gunn was a great writer. I visited his memorial above Dingwall just a couple of years ago. There is no one of Gunn's stature writing in modern Scotland except Angus Peter. Massie is our best novelist in English. Yes that is Angus Peter's novel up there. Hermanos I remember reading as a teenager. Very political writer . I think I would agree with what you say about the others. But I must say there was a streak of pessimism that I did not enjoy in Tree of Man so I prefer Voss. S math g bheil duine mar do lethid ann a sheo.

[Desolation]

I'm thinking I'll close the polls in a week, and post the final list not long after.

So, anyone who hasn't voted, or wants to update their list - better do it quick if you want your favorites included.

On that note, I'm updating my picks:
1. Ulysses by James Joyce
2. Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
3. The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
4. The Recognitions by William Gaddis
5. Three Novels: Molloy, Malone Dies, The Unnameable by Samuel Beckett
6. In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust
7. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky
8. Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller
9. Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov
10. The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

[dfw]

^infinite jest

[Eiseabhal]

Since Desolation - whoever he is - has offered to let us update or add to our list I'll take the opportunity to do that. I feel there is something autistic and male about lists especially like this but there is an element of fun and some learning.There are certainly very good books on all these lists now that I've had a chance to look at them. The Bible to me is not one book but many and I know in my Catholic tradition that it is not identical to the Bible of my Protestant Gaelic friends so I'd find it hard to include it. Looking at Desolation's own list I see a man (maybe it's a woman! Looks like a man's list though!) who likes the big beasts of literature. OOH but not Mr Joyce's opus.

So here is my last list and the one that counts. The others were just for fun. THIS is deadly Serious!

Zorba the Greek - Kazantzakis
Resurrection - Tolstoy
Tree of Man - White
Testament - Hutchinson
The Unforgotten Prisoner - Hutchinson
Moby Dick - Melville
Titus Groan - Peake
The Fox in the Attic - Hughes
The Adventures of Private Chonkin - Voinovich
Nostromo - Conrad

[ennison]

Ok. If you really want to be Serious Eiseabhal I shall modify my list too. I see what you mean about Desolation's "big beasts". Anyway here are some alternatives.

Life and Fate - V Grossman
Voss- Patrick White
Outer Dark - C McCarthy
The Arrow of Gold - J Conrad
The Night Before We Sailed - A P Campbell
The Channering Worm - J P McConndach
The Book of Job
Testament - R C Hutchinson
The Islander - A C Maclean
The First Circle - A Solzhenitsyn

So there you go. No poetry. No drama. No non-fiction. But ten great and worthwhile novels. I do believe that Blood Meridian is a bigger more accomplished novel than the one I chose but I really like the shorter McCarthy. I wanted to include T C Boyle's Water Music and Barbero's The Anonymous Novel but something had to be left out.

[Big Dante]

1. Anna Karenina - Tolstoy
2. The Brothers Karamazov - Dostoevsky
3. Les Miserables - Hugo
4. Don Quixote - Cervantes
5. Hamlet - Shakespeare
6. Slaughterhouse 5 - Vonnegut
7. The Lord of the Rings - Tolkien
8. Lolita - Nabokov
9. A Farewell to Arms - Hemmingway
10. On The Road - Kerouac

[Ser Nevarc]

1. Paradise Lost
2. The Marriage of Heaven & Hell
3. Manfred
4. Iliad
5. As I Lay Dying
6. Moby Dick
7. Crime and Punishment
8. Invitation to a Beheading
9. The Book of Thel
10. The Sorrows of Young Werther

[Desolation]

^infinite jest

Do you want to make a full 10-selection list, or do you want Infinite Jest to be your only pick?

[Desolation]

Last call.

I've got the final list ready to be put up tomorrow, if no one else votes.

[Desolation]

Closed