Editor Eric's top 99 works of literature

A stripped-down, ranked selection from Editor Eric's Greatest Literature of All Time list, highlighting the top 99 works of world literature across novels, plays, poems, and stories.

99 books · 95 in the collection · Original list (opens in a new tab)

  1. Don QuixoteMiguel de Cervantes Saavedra · 1600
  2. In Search of Lost TimeMarcel Proust · 1913
  3. Madame BovaryGustave Flaubert · 1856
  4. War and PeaceLeo Tolstoy · 1864
  5. The IliadHomer · c. 660 BCE
  6. The OdysseyHomer · c. 7th century BCE
  7. Crime and PunishmentFyodor Dostoevsky · 1866
  8. One Hundred Years of SolitudeGabriel García Márquez · 1967
  9. The Divine ComedyDante Alighieri · 1320
  10. Anna KareninaLeo Tolstoy · 1877
  11. UlyssesJames Joyce · 1920
  12. The Brothers KaramazovFyodor Dostoevsky · 1876
  13. Nineteen Eighty-FourGeorge Orwell · 1948
  14. Moby-DickHerman Melville · 1851
  15. LolitaVladimir Nabokov · 1955
  16. Pride and PrejudiceJane Austen · 1813
  17. Wuthering HeightsEmily Brontë · 1846
  18. BelovedToni Morrison · 1987
  19. FrankensteinMary Wollstonecraft Shelley · 1818
  20. The Great GatsbyF. Scott Fitzgerald · 1925
  21. Things Fall ApartChinua Achebe · 1958
  22. The Adventures of Huckleberry FinnMark Twain · 1876
  23. MiddlemarchGeorge Eliot · 1831
  24. The Handmaid's TaleMargaret Atwood · 1985
  25. The TrialFranz Kafka · 1918
  26. Oedipus TyrannusSophocles · c. 429 BCE
  27. The AeneidVirgil · c. 19 BCE
  28. HamletWilliam Shakespeare · 1603
  29. OresteiaAeschylus · 458 BCE
  30. Gulliver's TravelsJonathan Swift · 1726
  31. The Lord of the RingsJ.R.R. Tolkien · 1954
  32. Jane EyreCharlotte Brontë · 1846
  33. The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, GentlemanLaurence Sterne · 1759
  34. The Red and the BlackStendhal · not in the collection
  35. Alice's Adventures in WonderlandLewis Carroll · 1865
  36. Les MisérablesVictor Hugo · 1862
  37. The Tale of GenjiMurasaki Shikibu · 1000
  38. The Sound and the FuryWilliam Faulkner · 1929
  39. Midnight's ChildrenSalman Rushdie · 1981
  40. One Thousand and One NightsAnonymous · not in the collection
  41. The Canterbury TalesGeoffrey Chaucer · c. 1387
  42. The Count of Monte CristoAlexandre Dumas · 1844
  43. To Kill A MockingbirdHarper Lee · 1960
  44. FiccionesJorge Luis Borges · 1945
  45. AntigoneSophocles · c. 441 BCE
  46. Invisible ManRalph Ellison · 1952
  47. The Magic MountainThomas Mann · 1924
  48. DraculaBram Stoker · 1897
  49. DecameroneGiovanni Boccaccio · 1516
  50. Heart of DarknessJoseph Conrad · 1899
  51. Epic of GilgameshAnonymous · not in the collection
  52. The Catcher in the RyeJ. D. Salinger · 1945
  53. The Grapes of WrathJohn Steinbeck · 1939
  54. The StrangerAlbert Camus · 1942
  55. Mrs DallowayVirginia Woolf · 1923
  56. The MetamorphosisFranz Kafka · 1915
  57. The Portrait of a LadyHenry James · 1881
  58. The Picture of Dorian GrayOscar Wilde · 1890
  59. King LearWilliam Shakespeare · 1608
  60. Sentimental EducationGustave Flaubert · 1869
  61. Great ExpectationsCharles Dickens · 1860
  62. The Name of the RoseUmberto Eco · 1980
  63. Brave New WorldAldous Huxley · 1930
  64. CandideVoltaire · 1738
  65. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young ManJames Joyce · 1916
  66. The Golden NotebookDoris Lessing · 1962
  67. The MetamorphosesOvid · c. 8 CE
  68. The Master and MargaritaMikhail Bulgakov · 1918
  69. All Quiet on the Western FrontErich Maria Remarque · 1928
  70. En attendant GodotSamuel Beckett · 1952
  71. FaustJohann Wolfgang von Goethe · 1808
  72. To the LighthouseVirginia Woolf · 1925
  73. Love in the Time of CholeraGabriel García Márquez · 1985
  74. EmmaJane Austen · 1815
  75. The Little PrinceAntoine de Saint-Exupéry · 1943
  76. MedeaEuripides · 431 BCE
  77. Animal FarmGeorge Orwell · 1945
  78. The Man Without QualitiesRobert Musil · 1979
  79. Robinson CrusoeDaniel Defoe · 1686
  80. Memoirs Of HadrianMarguerite Yourcenar · 1956
  81. For Whom the Bell TollsErnest Hemingway · 1940
  82. Fathers and SonsIvan Turgenev · 1862
  83. Gargantua and PantagruelFrançois Rabelais · 1930
  84. Absalom, Absalom!William Faulkner · 1936
  85. Dead SoulsNikolai Gogol · 1942
  86. The LeopardGiuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa · 1958
  87. David CopperfieldCharles Dickens · 1849
  88. Ensaio Sobre a CegueiraJosé Saramago · 1995
  89. On The RoadJack Kerouac · 1957
  90. The Three MusketeersAlexandre Dumas · 1836
  91. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's StoneJ.K. Rowling · 1997
  92. The Age of InnocenceEdith Wharton · 1920
  93. Life of PiYann Martel · 2000
  94. The Sorrows of Young WertherJohann Wolfgang von Goethe · not in the collection
  95. The IdiotFyodor Dostoevsky · 1867
  96. A Tale of Two CitiesCharles Dickens · 1859
  97. Charterhouse of ParmaStendhal · 1839
  98. Under the VolcanoMalcolm Lowry · 1947
  99. Gone With the WindMargaret Mitchell · 1936