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J. Peder Zane, The Top Ten: Writers Pick Their Favorite Books [2007]

182 entries: 167 monographical, 15 otherwise

Ranked

Zane's book compiles lists from 125 writers naming "the ten greatest works of fiction of all time." The cumulative top ten that emerged from the project, presented at the beginning of the book, does not reveal any surprises. While some of the contributors definitely saw this project as an opportunity to promote obscure works, many of them clearly did not, producing lists no more idiosyncratic than most of the "great books" lists created by critics and scholars. Given that the top ten does not include any poetry or non-fiction, I have drawn out a longer list from this book. Thankfully, at least a few contributors ignored the "fiction" requirement, so we at least have one quasi-historical work, the Bible, plus a little poetry. Zane provides a master list with all 544 works collectively named by the 125 participants, and places them in order of the number of points they received (a first-place ranking from one of the 125 gets the work 10 points, a second-place ranking nine points, and so on). I haveve included all the works that received at least 10 points; therefore, all works that an author listed no. 1 are included. I could include all 544 titles—nothing in this project's guidelines demands otherwise; I might do so eventually. For now, you would have to read the book to see the works that received less than 10 points or to see which authors listed each of these works. A good article from Time magazine about the book is still online.

  1. Leo Tolstoy

    2. Anna Karenina
    published in part serially 1873-7 in Rússkij Véstnik; in its entirety, 1877—Russian

  2. Gustave Flaubert

    3. Madame Bovary
    originally published serially Oct. 1856-Dec. 1856 in La Revue de Paris—French

  3. Leo Tolstoy

    4. Voyna i Mir"
    War and Peace
    originally entitled 1805, published in part, 1865 and 1867; retitled and published in its entirety, 1869—Russian

  4. Vladimir Nabokov

    5. Lolita
    1955—English

  5. Mark Twain

    6. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
    1884—English

  6. William Shakespeare

    7. Hamlet
    1602—English

  7. F Scott Fitzgerald

    8. The Great Gatsby
    1925—English

  8. Marcel Proust
    À la Recherche du Temps Perdu
    In Search of Lost Time; In Remembrance of Things Past
    originally published in seven volumes, two of which originally published as two books each, 1913-27—French

    • Anton Chekhov

    9. Stories
    late Nineteenth-early Twentieth centuries—Russian

  9. George Eliot

    10. Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life
    originally published serially Dec. 1871-Dec. 1872—English

  10. Miguel de Cervantes

    11. El Ingenioso Hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha
    Don Quixote
    originally published in two volumes, 1605 and 1615—Spanish

  11. Herman Melville

    12. Moby-Dick; or, The Whale
    1851—English

  12. Charles Dickens

    13. Great Expectations
    originally published serially Dec. 1860-Aug. 1861 in All the Year Round—English

  13. James Joyce

    14. Ulysses
    published in part serially Mar. 1918-Dec. 1920 in the Little Review; in its entirety, 1922—English

  14. Homer

    15. Odýsseia
    The Odyssey
    ca. Ninth-Eighth centuries B C—Greek

  15. James Joyce

    16. Dubliners
    1914—English

  16. Fyodor Dostoevsky

    17. Prestuplénie i Nakazániye
    Crime and Punishment
    originally published serially Jan.-Dec. 1866 in Rússkij Véstnik—Russian

  17. William Shakespeare

    18. King Lear
    1606—English

  18. Jane Austen

    19. Emma
    originally anonymously published 1815—English

  19. Gabriel García Márquez

    20. Cien Anõs de Soledad
    One Hundred Years of Solitude
    1967—Spanish

  20. William Faulkner

    21. The Sound and the Fury
    1929—English

  21. Virginia Woolf

    22. To the Lighthouse
    1927 —English

  22. Fyodor Dostoevsky

    23. Brat'â Karamazovy
    The Brothers Karamazov
    originally published serially 1880 in Rússkij Véstnik—Russian

  23. Dante
    La Divina Commedia
    The Divine Comedy
    originally entitled La Commedia; written ca. 1308-21—Italian

    • Flannery O'Connor

    24. Stories
    Twentieth Century—English

  24. Laurence Sterne

    25. The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman
    originally published in nine volumes, 1759-67—English

  25. Jane Austen

    26. Pride and Prejudice
    originally anonymously published 1813—English

  26. Emily Brontë

    27. Wuthering Heights
    originally published 1847 under the pseudonym, Ellis Bell; revised 1850—English

    --
  27. The Bible

    28. —Hebrew; Aramaic; Greek

  28. Vladimir Nabokov

    29. Pale Fire
    1962—English

  29. William Faulkner

    30. Absalom, Absalom!
    1936—English

  30. Henry James

    31. The Portrait of a Lady
    originally published serially Oct. 1880-Nov. 1881 in Macmillan's and Nov. 1880-Dec. 1881 in the Atlantic Monthly—English

  31. Harper Lee

    32. To Kill a Mockingbird
    1960—English

  32. Geoffrey Chaucer

    33. Canterbury Tales
    1478—English

  33. Joseph Conrad

    34. Heart of Darkness
    originally published serially Feb.-Apr. 1899 in Blackwood's—English

  34. Virginia Woolf

    35. Mrs. Dalloway
    published in part, Jul. 1923, as 'Mrs. Dalloway in Bond Street', in the Dial; in its entirety, 1925—English

  35. Ralph Ellison

    36. Invisible Man
    1952—English

  36. Charles Dickens

    37. Bleak House
    originally published serially Mar. 1852-Sep. 1853—English

  37. Franz Kafka

    38. Der Prozess
    The Trial
    1925—German

  38. Toni Morrison

    39. Beloved
    1987—English

  39. Charlotte Brontë

    40. Jane Eyre: An Autobiography
    originally published under the pseudonym, Currer Bell, 1847—English

  40. Albert Camus

    41. L'Étranger
    The Stranger
    1942—French

  41. John Steinbeck

    42. The Grapes of Wrath
    1939—English

  42. Robert Penn Warren

    43. All the King's Men
    1946—English

  43. Ford Madox Ford

    44. The Good Soldier
    1915—English

  44. J D Salinger

    45. Catcher in the Rye
    1951—English

  45. Jane Austen

    46. Persuasion
    originally anonymously published 1817—English

  46. William Shakespeare

    47. Macbeth
    ca. 1607—English

  47. Aeschylus

    48. Oresteia
    The House of Atreus
    458 B C—Greek

  48. Nathaniel Hawthorne

    49. The Scarlet Letter
    1850—English

  49. Lewis Carroll

    50. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
    1865—English

  50. Stendhal

    51. Le Rouge et le Noir, Chronique du XIXe Siècle
    The Red and the Black
    1830—French

    John Updike
  51. Rabbit, Run

    52. 1960—English

  52. Rabbit Redux

    53. 1971—English

  53. Rabbit Is Rich

    54. 1981—English

  54. Rabbit at Rest
    1990—English

    • Isaac Babel

    55. Stories
    Twentieth Century—Russian

  55. F Scott Fitzgerald

    56. Tender Is the Night
    originally published serially Jan.-Apr. 1934 in Scribner's Magazine—English

  56. James Joyce

    57. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
    originally published serially Feb. 1914-Sep. 1915, in the Egoist—English

  57. Joseph Heller

    58. Catch-22
    1961—English

  58. Kurt Vonnegut
    Slaughterhouse-Five, or The Children's Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death
    1969—English

    • John Cheever

    59. Stories
    Twentieth Century—English

  59. John Milton

    60. Paradise Lost
    1667; revised 1674—English

  60. Virgil (Publius Vergilius Maro)

    61. Aeneid
    First Century B C—Latin

  61. Cormac McCarthy

    62. Blood Merdian or The Evening Redness in the West
    1985—English

  62. Walt Whitman

    63. Leaves of Grass
    1855; expanded and revised through ninth edition, 1892—English

  63. Nikolai Gogol

    64. Mërtvyâ Duši
    Dead Souls
    1842—Russian

  64. Thomas Mann
    Der Zauberberg
    The Magic Mountain
    1924—German

    • Eudora Welty

    65. Stories
    Twentieth Century—English

  65. Mikhail Bulgakov

    66. Mástyer i Margaríta
    The Master and Margarita
    published in part, 1966-67, in Moskva; in its entirety, 1973; revised 1989—Russian

  66. Charles Dickens

    67. Our Mutual Friend
    originally published serially May 1864-Nov. 1865—English

  67. William Faulkner

    68. As I Lay Dying
    1930—English

    The Hamlet
    1940—English

  68. Ernest Hemingway

    69. The Sun Also Rises
    1926—English

  69. Homer

    70. Iliad
    ca. Ninth-Eighth centuries B C—Greek

  70. Giovanni Boccaccio

    71. Il Decameron, Cognominato Prencipe Galeotto
    ca. 1351-53—Italian

  71. Fyodor Dostoevsky

    72. Besy
    Demons; The Devils; The Possessed
    1872—Russian

  72. Christina Stead

    73. The Man Who Loved Children
    1940—English

  73. Stendhal
    Le Chartreuse de Parme
    The Charterhouse of Parma
    1839—French

    • Ernest Hemingway

    74. Stories
    Twentieth Century—English

  74. Halldór Laxness

    75. Sjálfstætt Fólk
    Independent People
    originally published in two volumes, 1934 and 1935—Icelandic

    --
  75. Kitab alf Laylah Wa-Laylah

    76. The Thousand and One Nights; The Arabian Nights
    Ninth-Fifteenth centuries—Arabic

  76. Fyodor Dostoevsky

    77. Zapaski iz Podpol'â
    Notes From Underground
    1864—Russian

  77. Zora Neale Hurston

    78. Their Eyes Were Watching God
    1937—English

  78. Stephen King

    79. The Stand
    1978—English

  79. William Shakespeare

    80. The Tempest
    1611—English

  80. Sherwood Anderson

    81. Winesburg, Ohio: A Group of Tales of Ohio Small-Town Life
    1919; twenty-two stories, ten of which originally published in periodicals: 'The Book of the Grotesque', Feb. 1916 in Masses; 'Hands', Mar. 1916 in Masses; 'Paper Pills' (originally entitled 'The Philosopher'), Jun.-Jul. 1916 in the Little Review, ; 'The Strength of God', Aug. 1916 in Masses; 'Queer', Dec. 1916 in Seven Arts; 'The Untold Lie', Jan. 17 in Seven Arts; 'Mother', Mar. 1917 in Seven Arts; 'The Thinker', Sep. 1917 in Seven Arts; 'The Man of Ideas', Jun. 1918 in the Little Review; 'An Awakening', Dec. 1918 in the Little Review—English

  81. Lord Byron (George Gordon, Lord Byron)

    82. Don Juan
    originally published in six volumes: Jul. 1819; Aug. 1821; Jul. 1823; Aug. 1823; Dec. 1823; Mar. 1824—English

  82. Daniel Defoe

    83. The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner
    originally anonymously published 1719—English

  83. Henry Fielding

    84. The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling
    1749—English

  84. E M Forster

    85. A Passage to India
    1924—English

  85. Samuel Richardson

    86. Clarissa, or, the History of a Young Lady
    1748—English

  86. Voltaire
    Candide, ou L'Optimisme
    1759—French

    • Jorge Luis Borges

    87. Labyrinths
    English translations of stories mostly originally published in Ficciones and El Aleph—Spanish

  87. Raymond Chandler

    88. The Long Goodbye
    1953—English

    Evan S Connell
  88. Mrs. Bridge

    89. 1959—English

  89. Mr. Bridge

    90. 1969—English

  90. Thomas Hardy
    Tess of the d'Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented
    published in part serially Jul.-Dec. 1891 in the Graphic—English

    • Franz Kafka

    91. Stories
    early Twentieth Century—German

  91. George Orwell

    92. Nineteen Eighty-Four
    1949—English

  92. Jonathan Swift

    93. Travels Into Several Remote Nations of the World, in Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and Then a Captain of Several Ships
    Gulliver's Travels
    1726; revised 1735—English

  93. Rebecca West

    94. The Fountain Overflows
    1956—English

  94. James Agee

    95. A Death in the Family
    1957—English

  95. Italo Calvino
    Le Città Invisibili
    Invisible Cities
    1972—Italian

    • Emily Dickinson

    96. Poems
    Nineteenth Century—English

  96. E M Forster

    97. Howards End
    1910—English

  97. Graham Greene
    The Power and the Glory
    1940—English

    • Alice Munro

    98. Stories
    late Twentieth Century—English

    Anthony Powell
  98. A Question of Upbringing

    99. 1951—English

  99. A Buyer's Market

    100. 1952—English

  100. The Acceptance World

    101. 1955—English

  101. At Lady Molly's

    102. 1957—English

  102. Casanova's Chinese Restaurant

    103. 1960—English

  103. The Kindly Ones

    104. 1962—English

  104. The Valley of Bones

    105. 1964—English

  105. The Soldier's Art

    106. 1966—English

  106. The Military Philosophers

    107. 1968—English

  107. Books Do Furnish a Room

    108. 1971—English

  108. Temporary Kings

    109. 1973—English

  109. Hearing Secret Harmonies

    110. 1975—English

  110. Muriel Spark

    111. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
    1961—English

  111. Harriet Doerr

    112. Stones for Ibarra
    1984—English

  112. Günter Grass

    113. Die Blechtrommel
    The Tin Drum
    1959—German

  113. William Shakespeare

    114. Romeo and Juliet
    ca. 1591-97—English

  114. Charles Dickens

    115. The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery (Which He Never Meant to Publish on Any Account)
    originally published serially May 1849-Nov. 1850—English

  115. Theodore Dreiser
    Sister Carrie
    1900—English

    • William Faulkner

    116. 'The Bear'
    originally entitled 'Lion', published Dec. 1935 in Harper's; revised and retitled May 1942 for inclusion in the Saturday Evening Post; included in Go Down, Moses and Other Stories, 1942—English

  116. Ernest Hemingway

    117. For Whom the Bell Tolls
    1940—English

  117. Denis Johnson

    118. Jesus' Son
    1992—English

  118. Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa

    119. Il Gattopardo
    The Leopard
    1958—Italian

  119. Katherine Anne Porter

    120. Ship of Fools
    1962—English

    Sophocles
  120. Antigone

    121. ca. 441 B C—Greek

  121. Oidipous epi Kolōnō

    122. Oedipus at Colonus
    401 B C—Greek

  122. Oidipous Tyrannos

    123. Oedipus Rex; Oedipus the King
    ca. 429 B C—Greek

  123. John Steinbeck

    124. East of Eden
    1952—English

  124. Robert Louis Stevenson

    125. Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
    1886—English

  125. George Eliot

    126. Daniel Deronda
    1876—English

  126. Gabriel García Márquez

    127. El Amor en los Tiempos del Cólera
    Love in the Time of Cholera
    1985—Spanish

  127. Shirley Hazzard

    128. The Transit of Venus
    1980—English

  128. William Maxwell

    129. So Long, See You Tomorrow
    1979—English

  129. Toni Morrison

    130. Song of Solomon
    1977—English

  130. Émile Zola

    131. Germinal
    originally published serially Apr. 1884-Jan. 1885 in Gil Blas—French

  131. John Fante

    132. Ask the Dust
    1939—English

  132. Ford Madox Ford

    133. Parade's End
    originally published in four volumes: Some Do Not..., 1924; No More Parades, 1925; A Man Could Stand Up, 1926; Last Post, 1928—English

  133. Kazuo Ishiguro

    134. The Remains of the Day
    1989—English

  134. Henry James
    The Ambassadors
    originally published serially 1903 in the North American Review—English

    • J D Salinger

    135. Nine Stories
    originally published 1948-53 in varied periodicals: the New Yorker, Harper's, and the Information World Review—English

  135. William Makepeace Thackeray

    136. Vanity Fair: A Novel Without a Hero
    originally published serially Jan. 1847-Jul. 1848—English

  136. Richard Wright
    Native Son
    1940—English

    • Vyasa

    137. Bhagavad Gita
    part of the Mahabharata; ca. Ninth Century B C-Fourth Century—Sanskrit

  137. Abe Kobo

    138. Suna no Onna
    The Woman in the Dunes
    1962—Japanese

  138. Chinua Achebe

    139. Things Fall Apart
    1958—English

  139. John Banville

    140. The Untouchable
    1997—English

  140. Samuel Beckett
    Mal Vu Mal Dit
    Ill Seen Ill Said
    1981—French

    • Peter Blegvad

    141. The Book of Leviathan
    selection of Leviathan comic strips—English

  141. Millen Brand

    142. The Outward Room
    1937—English

  142. Elizabeth Barrett Browning

    143. Casa Guidi Windows
    1851—English

  143. Truman Capote
    Answered Prayers
    1986—English

    --
    • The Golden Argosy: The Most Celebrated Short Stories in the English Language

    144. 1955; anthology of 39 stories, four of which (Stephen Vincent Benét's The Devil and Daniel Webster, Max Beerbohm's The Happy Hypocrite, Booth Tarkington's Monsier Beaucaire, and Henry Van Dyke's The Story of the Other Wise Man) count as monographical works

  144. Stephen Vincent Benét

    145. The Devil and Daniel Webster
    originally published 1936 in the Saturday Evening Post—English

  145. Henry Van Dyke

    146. The Story of the Other Wise Man
    1895—English

  146. Booth Tarkington

    147. Monsieur Beaucaire
    1900—English

  147. Max Beerbohm

    148. The Happy Hypocrite
    originally published Oct. 1896 in the Yellow Book—English

  148. Willa Cather

    149. The Professor's House
    1925—English

  149. Kate Chopin

    150. The Awakening
    1899—English

    J M Coetzee
  150. Disgrace

    151. 1999—English

  151. Waiting for the Barbarians

    152. 1980—English

  152. Katherine Dunn

    153. Geek Love
    1989—English

  153. Louise Eldrich

    154. Love Medicine
    1984—English

  154. William Gaddis

    155. J R
    1975—English

  155. Robert Graves

    156. I, Claudius: From the Autobiography of Tiberius Claudius, Born 10 B C, Murdered and Deified A D 54
    1934—English

  156. Henry James

    157. The Golden Bowl
    1904—English

  157. T E Lawrence

    158. Seven Pillars of Wisdom
    1922—English

  158. C S Lewis

    159. The Screwtape Letters
    1942—English

  159. Sándor Márai

    160. A Gyertyák Csonkig Égnek
    Embers
    1942—Hungarian

  160. Herman Melville

    161. The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade
    1857—English

    Harold Pinter
  161. The Birthday Party

    162. 1958—English

  162. The Homecoming

    163. 1965—English

  163. Mercè Rodoreda

    164. La Plaça del Diamant
    The Time of the Doves
    1962—Catalan

  164. William Shakespeare

    165. Antony and Cleopatra
    ca. 1606-08—English

  165. Tanizaki Junichiro

    166. Sasameyuki
    The Makioka Sisters
    published in part serially Jan.-Mar. 1943 in Chuo Koron; in its entirety in three volumes: 1946, 1947, and 1948—Japanese

    Émile Zola
  166. L'Assommoir

    167. 1877—French

  167. Nana

    168. originally published serially 1879-80 in La Voltaire—French