My List Of The 25 Landmarks Of World Literature

[goldstategop]

1. Iliad
2. Odyssey
3. Bible
4. Dialogues Of Plato
5. Ethics Aristotle
6. Politics Aristotle
7. Voyage Of Argo Apolonius Of Rhodes
8. Metamorphoses Ovid
9. Aeneid Virgil
10. City Of God Augustine
11. Summa Theologica Thomas
12. Divine Comedy Dante
13. Decameron Boccacio
14. Essays Montaigne
15. Don Quixote Cervantes
16. Complete Works Shakespeare
17. Pensees Pascal
18. Wealth Of Nations Smith
19. Federalist Hamilton
20. Communist Manifesto Marx and Engels
21. Les Miserables Hugo
22. War And Peace Tolstoy
23. Ulysses Joyce
24. In Search Of Lost Time Proust
25. Lord Of The Rings Tolkien

[rfp1234]

Atlas Shrugged.
The Road to Serfdom.
Animal Farm.
1984.
The collected works of Milton Friedman.

[goldstategop]

Gulliver’s Travels.

Satire has a long history. For me, the Good Soldier Svejk comes to mind in illustrating the absurdity of war.

[Vendome]

Darn...

[rfp1234]

Hamlet contains more expressions that made it into modern English usage than any of the other plays.

[BookmanTheJanitor]

Surprised this didn't make the list :o). In all seriousness, good list.

[pax_et_bonum]

I wasn’t going to mention it, but you also left off all of The Far Side books.

[Garth Tater]

My list of the 25 most influential works... Almost every one has read them.

What world do you live in? /* snicker */

[taxesareforever]

The Bible is always a #1 in books. Why not here?

[P-Marlowe]

Almost every one has read them.

I read the Cliff notes.

[AlmaKing]

Those are hardly landmark books when compared to the list below:

The Bible
US Constitution in original form
Declaration of Independence
The Federalist

Seems like those have shaped the world’s political and economic systems and positively affected the global population more than anything on your original list.

On the negative list:

Koran
Communist Manifesto
Mein Kampf
Rules for Radicals

Some books are meant to be burned.

[Sgt_Schultze]

I believe everything I’m told, or so I’m told.

[goldstategop]

I arranged them in chronological order.

Of course, leftists will disparage it because its about DEWM.

And it leaves out the literature of India, China and Japan but those ideas came late to the West.

[AlmaKing]

Yes, I see you have the Bible and The Federalist, but placing the Iliad and Odyssey before them doesn’t work. The Iliad and the Odyssey didn’t cause mass migrations, wars, prosperity, suffering.

[goldstategop]

Or banned.

Censorship seldom works to beat back bad ideas.

Thankfully, people are in a position to judge them on their merits today.

[wpjmd]

Tom Wolfe on the honorable mention list please. Radical Chic & Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers to Kingdom of Speech.

[dr_lew]

Apollonius to Eudemus greeting.

If you are in good health and matters are in other respects as you wish, it is well; I am pretty well too.

- Greek Mathematical Works II, Loeb Classical Library

Time out of time. Yes that is THE Apollonius, and YOU ARE THERE!

[chajin]

Western thought, OK. World Lit, it needs the Mahabharata, Tale of Genji, the Tao Te Ching, and the Analects of Confucius.

[chajin]

Now you’re cooking with gas!-oh wait a minute...

[Nifster]

Number should be number one.

Sadly most people have not read many of the books on your list

[shibumi]

"Some books are meant to be burned."

Poisons, administered in specific doses and with a full understanding of their dangers, are invaluable in medicine.

E.G. I, myself take a microdose of a deadly poison (Digitalis) every day.

By that same token a controlled study of Evil in Print can provide the tools of its undoing.