This is old news, but in 1998 Random House generated one of those "100 Best Novels" lists as voted by a panel and by readers. Interestingly there was quite the disconnect between what both groups favored:
The Board’s Top 5
- ULYSSES by James Joyce
- THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald
- A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
- LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov
- BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley
The People’s Top 5
- ATLAS SHRUGGED by Ayn Rand
- THE FOUNTAINHEAD by Ayn Rand
- BATTLEFIELD EARTH by L. Ron Hubbard
- THE LORD OF THE RINGS by J.R.R. Tolkien
- TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD by Harper Lee
The People’s Top 10 had three Hubbard and four Rand titles. Interestingly, the "100 Best Non-Fiction" list also has the same disconnect with three books by or about Rand, and (at #2) Hubbard’s Dianetics. Madness, I tell ya, madness!
So, readers, what would your top five novels since 1900 be?
For what it is worth, I have read 17 of the Board’s choices and 32 of the People’s (details below the fold). I clearly need to read more fiction.
Board’s List
- ULYSSES by James Joyce
- A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
- BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley
- CATCH-22 by Joseph Heller
- 1984 by George Orwell
- I, CLAUDIUS by Robert Graves
- SLAUGHTERHOUSE-FIVE by Kurt Vonnegut
- INVISIBLE MAN by Ralph Ellison
- HENDERSON THE RAIN KING by Saul Bellow
- ANIMAL FARM by George Orwell
- LORD OF THE FLIES by William Golding
- THE NAKED AND THE DEAD by Norman Mailer
- PALE FIRE by Vladimir Nabokov
- ON THE ROAD by Jack Kerouac
- A CLOCKWORK ORANGE by Anthony Burgess
- HEART OF DARKNESS by Joseph Conrad
- THE CALL OF THE WILD by Jack London
People’s List
- THE LORD OF THE RINGS by J.R.R. Tolkien
- 1984 by George Orwell
- ULYSSES by James Joyce
- CATCH-22 by Joseph Heller
- DUNE by Frank Herbert
- STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND by Robert Heinlein
- BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley
- ANIMAL FARM by George Orwell
- GRAVITY’S RAINBOW by Thomas Pynchon
- SLAUGHTERHOUSE FIVE by Kurt Vonnegut
- LORD OF THE FLIES by William Golding
- A PRAYER FOR OWEN MEANY by John Irving
- THE STAND by Stephen King
- BELOVED by Toni Morrison
- ON THE ROAD by Jack Kerouac
- HEART OF DARKNESS by Joseph Conrad
- AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS by H.P. Lovecraft
- THE HITCHHIKER’S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY by Douglas Adams
- THE HANDMAID’S TALE by Margaret Atwood
- A CLOCKWORK ORANGE by Anthony Burgess
- A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
- STARSHIP TROOPERS by Robert Heinlein
- THE WORLD ACCORDING TO GARP by John Irving
- INVISIBLE MAN by Ralph Ellison
- ZEN AND THE ART OF MOTORCYCLE MAINTENANCE by Robert Pirsig
- I, CLAUDIUS by Robert Graves
- WATERSHIP DOWN by Richard Adams
- NAKED LUNCH by William S. Burroughs
- IT by Stephen King
- V. by Thomas Pynchon
- SOMETIMES A GREAT NOTION by Ken Kesey
- THE SATANIC VERSES by Salman Rushdie
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There's another one of those book lists circulating - a list of 100 works of which it is claimed that the average American has read only six. Whether that is true or not (and Chad doesn't believe it), the list contains the usual mixed bag of works.
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Was the people's list generated from an online poll? Because it seems like it was hijacked by nerds (obviously not literature nerds) and scientologists.
As for my list:
1) Pale Fire, Vladimir Nabokov
2) Infinite Jest, David Foster Wallace
3) Look Homeward Angel, Thomas Wolfe
4) One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
5) Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad
Pale Fire is probably the closest to a perfect piece of literature I've ever read.
Try these on fpr size
Mrs. Dalloway (Woolf)
Sons and Lovers (Lawrence)
Of Human Bondage (Maugham)
The Alexandrian Quartet (Durrell)
East of Eden (Steinbeck)
*******
genre novels:
Brighton Rock (Greene)
The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (Le Carré)
I recall there was a similar poll in the UK, by Waterstones ( a bookstore chain) and the Lord of the Rings came out on top, much to the disgust of the literati.
Either Waterstone's poll was better conducted to avoid mass voting by Ayn Rand fans (gee, I thought they were supposed to be individualists) or the Brits have never heard of her.
Having just perused the list, I realize I would have put Nostromo (Conrad) in, had I thought of it.
Also The Heart of the Matter (Greene),
and To the Lighthouse (Woolf)
but i liked the ones I picked by these authors better.
My top five, in no particular order.
Joseph Conrad, The Secret Agent
Rudyard Kipling, Kim
John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath
Joseph Heller, Catch-22
William Kennedy, Ironweed
And, just for the pure art of spinning a yarn, John Buchan's John Macnab
The Waterstones poll is online. Here are the top ten from that:
And no Rand or Hubbard to be seen in the list.
Oh, and I'd read 43% of that list.
Aside from #1, these are in no particular order.
Swordspoint Ellen Kushner
The Tiger in the Smoke Margery Allingham
A Room With a View E.M. Forster
Night's Master Tanith Lee
Deerskin Robin McKinley
For all I read, I've read 8/15 of the two lists. On the other hand, I had to keep excluding books from my top five because they were written too early.
What does 'best' refer to here? Does it mean 'does stuff to my head but I still had to read it through...', or 'enjoyable and entertaining', or 'life-changingly brilliant'?
I'd also draw your attention to the matter of timeliness. Terry Pratchett once said something like: '...for a 13 year old boy to think that 'Lord of the Rings' is the greatest book ever written is perfectly natural. If someone still thinks so when they reach 30, its' time to get worried...'
Many of the books which have dramatic impacts on us are read when we are in our teens. Retrospectively, they are often not quite as wonderful or insightful as we recall. Many of the books which please us as adults are pleasurable for a whole complex range of reasons, but rarely do they hit us with the impact of that first reading of 'Catcher in the Rye' or 'Animal Farm'.
My 'top ten' would have to include about a hundred books. I've read 68 of the Waterstone's 100; I even vaguely recall some of them. As your post isn't really meant to be taken so seriously, here is a list of 7 authors whose books I currently consume with anticipation and pleasure:
Iain M Banks
Garry Kilworth
Terry Pratchett
Steven Erikson
Bernard Cornwell
Ian Rankin
Robert Rankin
Regards,
I really resist rating and prioritizing artwork of any kind because any one thing speaks to each person uniquely at that moment in their lives.
I must say, however, the Ursala Le Guin's The Dispossessed and then The Left Hand of Darkness really had an impact on me and have continued to do so after every subsequent read.
Earlier, The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Justin was an eye-opening experience for me and is still a delight.
Ohhhhhhhh, books....
www.theskinofmyteeth.com
David B.
In general I don't have a problem with the novels selected by the panel, but ... no Kafka!? No Dostoevsky!? That's just wrong.
@Norm
No Dostoevsky!?
Considering he died in 1881 and the poll is for novels written in the 1900's ...
Oh, quite right. Still, there's the omission of Kafka, and what about Proust's "In Search of Lost Time"? That should at least be in the top 10.
The Random House list does not have much in the way of translations (I am not sure about Darkness at Noon), while the British list has quite a few. That could explain the absence of Kafka.
If translations are allowed in I would go for The Plague, by Camus
Paul01, I agree, The Plague belongs on the list.
or the Brits have never heard of her
Yup. Ayn Who?