Posted on 02/13/2017 11:09:14 PM PST by 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
Almost every one has read them. Should be on people's bucket list, since you can't read everything in the world in a single lifetime.
Jonathan Livingston Seagull
And no Shakespeare, no Hamlet? I would not put Joyce, Proust, or Tolkien on this list.
I’ve started out with Proust. Famous longest novel in the world.
Waiting for the Yale set to be completed, if I’m fortunate enough to see it. William C. Carter’s annotations to the first two volumes of a projected seven are superb.
The Everyman’s Library edition from UK has a superb introduction by the renowned Harold Bloom.
At 4000 pages, its a grand study of a human life time from childhood to death.
Oops, I see you put a “Complete Works of Shakespeare.” Kind of a cheat, since it’s not one work. And we can’t even agree on what plays that would include.
The original Archie comics
Bubble gum wrappers
Playboy
the Hardy Boys
Anything by Louis L’Amour
National Geographic with pictures of tribes women
Weekly Reader
Kon Tiki
Lightfoot the deer
Robin hood
My little Pony
Took me 5 years to finish Adam Smith
Admittedly, its somewhat arbitrary.
Then again, if you removed some and added others, the list would be different.
That said, its a good guide through the ticket of world literature.
Shakespeare is the greatest writer, period.
Then again the Sonnets are a compact introduction to his genius.
that’s an excellent list! a couple missing for me: Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis... Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville... i am fortunate to have been able to cover much of this list with my sons as we homeschooled...
It’s incomplete without anything from Maya Angelou or Toni Morrison - or so I’ve been lead to believe.
You left off Catch-22.
That’s a great start.
Gotta add Beowulf.
I left off late twentieth century/early twenty-first century authors.
You usually have to wait a century to see if any one makes the cut.
“Till We Have Faces” is my favorite writing of C.S. Lewis.
The Prince by Machiavelli.
A lot of people would add Chaucer, Poe, Mann and Camus to the list.
Then there’s existentialism with Satre and Beauvoir.
;-)
Good list. Most influential on English/American thought would need to include Pilgim’s Progress.
I would agree. I would substitute The Prince for the Pensees.
Also worthy of consideration is Clausewitz’s On War.
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