Lit Nets Top 100 Books Official List

[Virgil]

Oops, I miscounted. I have read 50 of the 100. I had to write them down to count correctly. The ones I have read are:
2, 3, 4, 7, 8, 9, 12, 16, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 28, 29, 30, 34, 35, 36, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 52, 53, 54, 62, 63, 64, 66, 67, 68, 76, 78, 84, 85, 86, 87, 90, 93, 95, and 97.

[Jeremiah Jazzz]

Great list. Cool to see Proust, Joyce, Melville, Nabokov, of course Dostoevsky. Also neat to see some of the smaller pieces like No Exit. But Night? ugh, I thought that book was awful!

[Mopey Droney]

I am saddened that Great Expectations didn't make the cut. Then again I cannot be too sad as I myself didn't participate.

[Dark Muse]

Yes I thought No Exit was wonderfu and astounding. I am glad it was able to squeeze in.

Great Expectations was a close runner up.

[Psycheinaboat]

I've read 41 from the list. Am I the only one who wonders/worries if she will live long enough to read everything that she wants? A friend told me not to worry about it because I will just die and my brains and everything will ooze into the dirt.

Staying with my parents over the holidays, there was a black and white film short between regular programming that looked like something that may have been taken from a Twilight Zone episode. The gent had neglected life to read and when he died he thought he had went to Heaven because he was surrounded by mounds of books and all eternity to read them. Then he tripped and broke his glasses.

[Dark Muse]

I've read 41 from the list. Am I the only one who wonders/worries if she will live long enough to read everything that she wants?

Haha I think about that all the time

[Zee.]

I'm glad The Fountainhead was there, but where was Atlas Shrugged!

Also - In cold blood - loved that. I didn't think it'd get many votes though.

I am saddened that Great Expectations didn't make the cut. Then again I cannot be too sad as I myself didn't participate.

Great Expectations left a terrible taste in my mouth...

[Dark Muse]

I think Atlas Shrugged recivied one vote. I know Anthem got one. Though I have not read that one yet myself.

[Peggy-O]

Dammit, I've only read 8.

[bazarov]

I've read 13 of first 20, and 4 of first 5 are on my top 10 list Glad to see that Dostoevsky is so superior and that Tolkien, Rowling and Brown are far from top.

Finally some good list of truly great books. Thanks Dark Muse!

Edited: 37 totally, I suck in American literature

[Kafka's Crow]

42/100 (after a re-count). Not bad for someone who was forced to give up serious reading a decade ago (job, family, the internet!). I have read 9 of the top 10 and will never read The Great Gatsby (life is too short and there are far too many good books available to force myself into reading something that I don't want to.)

[Zee.]

Hmm ...

Jane Eyre, yucky yucky.

Some books just make me feel groggy...

The Sound and The Fury - beautiful so i hear..

[JBI]

Yay, virtually no verse (I think none lyrical), - it's a bit depressing actually.

Besides that though, I was looking for some big ones, like Light in August, but I think I missed it - though a couple other Faulkners are up there, which is good to see.

It's also a little disappointing that Canada didn't make the list - perhaps maybe Fifth Business or something, but nothing came up. The list itself seems to leave so many cultures out, and hammer in the UK - US grid thoroughly, especially in the modernist to contemporary works. I guess we are willing to appropriate the Comedia, but not the Canti of Leopardi.

It would be interesting to cross the results with, for instance, posts by users who have 500+ posts on these boards, etc.


Still no surprise that Dostoevsky takes first - as everyone here seems to be Crime and Punishment obsessed. I would have put it somewhere around 80 on a personal list, but perhaps I am dated - though I find Doestoevsky's vision to be quite different than my own literary vision, to the point where his objectives seem a little troubling to me, and his prose to be quite boring at times.

Also, counted 21 that I hadn't read, or at least partially read than stopped (I drew the line on those which I put down for aesthetic reasons, and not for time reasons). I'll recount later, but In the top 50 it was only like 4 or so that I hadn't read.

[Hank Stamper]

It would be interesting to cross the results with, for instance, posts by users who have 500+ posts on these boards, etc.

why? what does number of posts have to do with anything other than imply you have plenty of spare time on your hands.. it doesn't make your opinion any more valid/interesting.

ps. great work Dark Muse!

[bazarov]

why? what does number of posts have to do with anything other than imply you have plenty of spare time on your hands.. it doesn't make your opinion any more valid/interesting.

ps. great work Dark Muse!

Because too many people come here, leave 20 posts and then disappear. Members with more then 500 posts (that's an example) (without those ''General Chat'' freaks, there are members with 5000 posts and I never seen them in General Literature section) are true members of this forum and thread is called Lit Nets Top...
Of course, don't be offended with that; it's not your fault you just discovered this site