Based on the methodology, this is not really a list of top 100 novels, it's a list of 100 top 10 novels. It's a subtle difference, but I think it introduces a type of bias into the results. I...
Exemplary
Based on the methodology, this is not really a list of top 100 novels, it's a list of 100 top 10 novels. It's a subtle difference, but I think it introduces a type of bias into the results.
I created a list of all the novels the reviewers ranked (172 people each picked 10 novels) and ranked them all based on just how many times they appeared in the rankings, ignoring the actual ranking.
There is a total of 659 unique novels ranked, and to place in the top 50, it only takes 6 of the 172 reviewers to include it on their list. 3 out of 172 places the novel in top 91-131.
I think anything past the top 50 or so on this list is mostly dominated by noise, there isn't enough data to really separate the novels past that, or make much conclusion about. Many of the novels ranked 100-250 here (which includes most of the books mentioned by the other commenters as missing) could have just as easily ended up in the top 100 with just different sampling.
Edit: fixed some errors and dupes, it's 659 unique novels now - there was actually a significant number of duplicates in the raw data, where either the name of the author or title were spelled differently for the same novel
Edit 2: to illustrate the type of bias I am talking about, here is a list of novels but only including novels ranked #1 on any of the top 10 lists - so this is a list of 92 #1 novels, as opposed to 100 top 10 novels. Many novels from outside the original top 100 now make an appearance due to at least one reviewer granting them the #1 spot on their list, like LotR, while some previously highly ranked novels are gone (e.g. Jane Eyre with 21 votes, but not a single #1) I bet if the reviewers were asked to list 20 or more novels each, the results would be still different. Even using a different weighting based on the top 10 placement would likely shuffle the results significantly, ending up with a different list of 100.
Thank you, I love that you did this! 666 items and Foucault's Pendulum is not among them? What a worthless jury, excuse my candor. Three people did mention The Name of the Rose and there's one...
Thank you, I love that you did this!
666 items and Foucault's Pendulum is not among them? What a worthless jury, excuse my candor. Three people did mention The Name of the Rose and there's one Murakami book listed (one I have yet to read), but where is 1Q84?
...Actually, I'd love to see a list made by Tildeians. We might get more obscure, left-field results that are equally worth reading.
I would not have included works that were first published in other languages and then translated into English. That would knock a fair number out of this list. They weasel-worded it as "published...
I would not have included works that were first published in other languages and then translated into English. That would knock a fair number out of this list.
They weasel-worded it as "published in English" rather than best English language novels as is stated in the title here at Tildes, so they gave themselves wiggle room.
But what do I know? I've only read a handful of these books. Eleven for sure. Don't remember if I ever finished 1984.
1984 is one of those books where if you do actually finish it you will know that its not about what most people think its about. The real ending is SO dark. The absolute hopelessness of that...
1984 is one of those books where if you do actually finish it you will know that its not about what most people think its about.
The real ending is SO dark. The absolute hopelessness of that reality is something thats definitely stuck in my head. I didn’t really get it until I read it again as an adult.
Great Gatsby, Fahrenheit 451, Brave New World, all those hit different as an adult.
I believe one of the most important lessons of 1984 is just how dark it is. People gravitate towards happy endings but the reality 1984 warns against is not some magic victory.
I believe one of the most important lessons of 1984 is just how dark it is. People gravitate towards happy endings but the reality 1984 warns against is not some magic victory.
It is one thing I hate about movies. They almost universally wipe away the real ending, replaced with a feelgood. Which is kinda dystopian in its own right when you think about it.
It is one thing I hate about movies. They almost universally wipe away the real ending, replaced with a feelgood.
Which is kinda dystopian in its own right when you think about it.
I keep waffling on my opinion of this approach. On one hand, I completely agree that it feels a little underhanded, though on the other hand, I’m glad that translated works that hold up (decently)...
I keep waffling on my opinion of this approach. On one hand, I completely agree that it feels a little underhanded, though on the other hand, I’m glad that translated works that hold up (decently) are acknowledged too. I’m monolingual and am incredibly grateful that excellent translations of works like Don Quixote and One Hundred Years of Solitude exist, and that lists like this shine a spotlight on them instead of leaving them off because they weren’t originally written in English, otherwise a dunce like me might never have given them the time of day.
I'm torn. On the one hand, that's a pretty logical argument. Hard to disagree with. On the other, translations have had massive effects on not just the English language, but also English writing...
I'm torn. On the one hand, that's a pretty logical argument. Hard to disagree with. On the other, translations have had massive effects on not just the English language, but also English writing and English fiction. Even if we put aside Dostoevsky, The Iliad is a translation, you know?
Because not all translations are equal. Some works may not translate well to English at all and some translators may make better translations of works than others. These are the best 100 novels...
Because not all translations are equal. Some works may not translate well to English at all and some translators may make better translations of works than others. These are the best 100 novels presented in English according to this publisher, not necessarily originally written in English. I'm sure there are some books written in Hindi that are just amazing but fall flat in English and there are certain themes that are so compelling in any language that even as written in English they are rendered among the best works of fiction. Likewise, translation can in and of itself be an art and if a translator is able to convey a writer's intentions extremely well in English and the end result is exceptionally good (like 100 best books ever good) then I don't see any reason why it shouldn't be on this list.
Continuing with your opening line, "Because not all translations are equal", I think a more interesting list could have been made with the goal of highlighting the best translations to English....
Continuing with your opening line, "Because not all translations are equal", I think a more interesting list could have been made with the goal of highlighting the best translations to English. The 100 best novel translations to English might be very helpful.
Poll foreign authors, scholars, publishers, and the translators themselves, and come up with the most highly regarded translations. Also point out why they are seen as outstanding. I would appreciate this type of effort far more than just another "best novels" list.
It says at the top of the Guardian article "The greatest literature ever published in English, as voted for by authors, critics and academics worldwide. How many have you read?"
It says at the top of the Guardian article "The greatest literature ever published in English, as voted for by authors, critics and academics worldwide. How many have you read?"
Sure, and that makes sense. Presumably the people making the ranking can only read proficiently in English, so the list can only comprise works published in English. That does not say that the...
Sure, and that makes sense. Presumably the people making the ranking can only read proficiently in English, so the list can only comprise works published in English.
That does not say that the work itself is in English.
You’re right about the “published in English” aspect, as “English-language” was something I added to their original title (which was just “The 100 best novels of all time”). I edited the title...
You’re right about the “published in English” aspect, as “English-language” was something I added to their original title (which was just “The 100 best novels of all time”).
I edited the title here to fit better with the list’s contents.
Watership Down isn't there? Lord of the Rings? Wizard of Oz? Salem's Lot? Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy? I call shenanigans. Watership Down is an utter masterpiece of nested storytelling. The...
Watership Down isn't there?
Lord of the Rings?
Wizard of Oz?
Salem's Lot?
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy?
I call shenanigans.
Watership Down is an utter masterpiece of nested storytelling. The Peter Capaldi audiobook is utterly astonishing, the way he is able to have a distinct voice for each storytelling rabbit, with each rabbit voice doing their own voices in the stories they are telling.
Lord of the Rings is almost unquestioningly the most influental novel in the last 80 years.
Wizard of Oz was declared "America's greatest and best-loved homegrown fairytale" by the Library of Congress.
Stephen King trumped Bram Stoker with Salem's Lot the way Jonny Cash trumped NIN with Hurt.
Hitchhiker's Guide is just a good time and anybody who says otherwise probably deserves what's coming for them.
I never know how to feel about these lists. You know I think the methodology here is decent but it also leads to an obvious skew away from genre or really anything niche(I mean, the Left Hand of...
I never know how to feel about these lists. You know I think the methodology here is decent but it also leads to an obvious skew away from genre or really anything niche(I mean, the Left Hand of Darkness was seminal, but is that really the ONLY sci-fi representation here? Unless I missed something), towards the classics, and sometimes towards very high placements of books that I would personally characterize as more "impressive" than "good" (Ulysses,The Man Without Qualities). Speaking of Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften, I always find it slightly stupid to put works in translation on lists like these. It says English in the title, right? Why is the Quixote there? Why Pedro Páramo and One Hundred Years of Solitude and Invisible Cities -- brilliant books no doubt, that are among my personal favorites, but are also works in translation where, somewhat notoriously, their ambiguity and poeticisms often fail to come across in English?
I guess lists like these are best as jumping off points for discussion, but I tend to prefer more personal lists anyway because by attempting to be definitive these come out kinda anonymous.
Anyway I do agree with a lot of these picks in full: Catch 22, Wuthering Heights, the Nabokov stuff (if I'm right in remembering that Nabokov wrote in English and then his family translated it into Russian). All holds up marvelously. I do wonder what more recent novels will be making lists like this in fifty years when they're "eligible." Chain Gang All Stars, maybe. House of Leaves? I mostly read dyke-y genre stuff these days so I'm not hugely tapped in.
I was puzzled by the books in translation. I mean, The Master and Margarita (#66 on this list) is one of my personal favorites, but I wouldn't put it on a list of top novels in English. For Pete's...
I was puzzled by the books in translation. I mean, The Master and Margarita (#66 on this list) is one of my personal favorites, but I wouldn't put it on a list of top novels in English. For Pete's sake, at least tell us which translation deserves the spot, since translation quality and style can vary so much!
Which translation is especially true for The Master and Margarita. There are multiple translations with different strengths and tones. When I decided to read it picking which version took some...
Which translation is especially true for The Master and Margarita. There are multiple translations with different strengths and tones. When I decided to read it picking which version took some research.
Which translation did you end up reading ? Were you happy with the choice ? I've read and still own a Slovak translation, and later also the Ginsburg English translation, but both of those are...
Which translation did you end up reading ? Were you happy with the choice ?
I've read and still own a Slovak translation, and later also the Ginsburg English translation, but both of those are from 1967, and apparently based on the censored text published in USSR back then.
I loved the book, and would love to revisit one of the more complete uncensored versions again. I can understand Russian fairly OK, but not quite on the level to be able to read a book like this unfortunately.
This week, we reveal our list of the 100 greatest novels published in English, as voted for by authors and critics around the world. We polled 172 authors, critics and academics for their top 10 novels of all time, published in English, and asked them to rank their choices in order of preference. We scored the titles according to how often they were voted for, and then added a weighting based on individual rankings to produce the overall list of 100 greatest books.
I sort of understand why lists like this always have to have a handful of boring books on them. I think. Here's what I don't get though: why is it always the ones that are boring in a boring way...
I sort of understand why lists like this always have to have a handful of boring books on them. I think. Here's what I don't get though: why is it always the ones that are boring in a boring way (In Search of Lost Time, One Hundred Years of Solitude) when there are equally high quality boring works that are boring in an interesting way (Umberto Eco: Foucault's Pendulum, The Name of the Rose)?
And why is there no Murakami when they've included Dostoyevsky, Cervantes, Proust, Kafka, Tolstoy, Ishiguro, Flaubert, Garcia Marquez and other such great "English language" authors? And like others already said, why go "English language" if you're then going to list all your run-of-the mill non-English classics anyway? Why not just "literature"? Maybe give a chance for actual English language authors to appear on a list like this - maybe even someone who hasn't been mentioned 15698309 times on similar lists already? What exactly is the point here?
(Sorry folks, I didn't sleep well and I'm cranky!)
No real answer, but as someone who considers One Hundred Years of Solitude in a whole other class above anything else I've ever read and couldn't tell you a single thing about my experience...
No real answer, but as someone who considers One Hundred Years of Solitude in a whole other class above anything else I've ever read and couldn't tell you a single thing about my experience reading Foucault's Pendulum I find your comment fascinating. We always know about different preferences but rarely see it so starkly shown.
My best guess at an answer is momentum. A book is considered good and so it always comes up when people think about making these lists.
Above anything else you have read, really? :D That's amazing and makes me happy! Are you going to start raving about Mark Twain next or something? (Just another often mentioned writer whose works...
in a whole other class above anything else I've ever read
Above anything else you have read, really? :D That's amazing and makes me happy! Are you going to start raving about Mark Twain next or something? (Just another often mentioned writer whose works I can't quite get into, thankfully not on this list though.)
My best guess at an answer is momentum. A book is considered good and so it always comes up when people think about making these lists.
I guess so. I just can't escape the feeling that some people (perhaps a lot of people) say they like the Iliad, or Moby-Dick, or Pride and Prejudice or whatever they think is widely enjoyed by others - not because they really enjoy it, or reading for that matter, but as a signaling device of some sort. And that some books have been riding on that sort of momentum ever since they first got established as a non-controversial mark of.. evolved taste? I'm probably wrong and just salty because I've been so often disappointed.
Also, I haven't read most of what was listed here so who knows how many absolute gems are on it, obscured only by my own ignorance! At least there is one item on there that I truly enjoyed: Rushdie's Midnight's Children.
I've read 16 books that appear on here, Ulysses is my favorite of those so checks out that it's so high up. None of them feel out of place except maybe Rebecca? But even that one I like a lot. The...
I've read 16 books that appear on here, Ulysses is my favorite of those so checks out that it's so high up. None of them feel out of place except maybe Rebecca? But even that one I like a lot. The most represented author I've read is Virginia Woolf, I've read 4 of her books that are on the list, and they certainly all belong there!
The critiques in the methodology here are making me feel better about my ignorance of so many of these titles! In quintiles (starting at 1-20 ending at 81-100), I've heard of, but not necessarily...
The critiques in the methodology here are making me feel better about my ignorance of so many of these titles!
In quintiles (starting at 1-20 ending at 81-100), I've heard of, but not necessarily read: 15, 14, 6, 6, and 5 books on the list. Read only 11 (plus a couple more dnf'd).
Blood Meridian is an amazing read if you can stomach it. So is The Road. The quality of the prose is practically otherworldly. But good god is it hard on the soul.
Blood Meridian is an amazing read if you can stomach it. So is The Road. The quality of the prose is practically otherworldly. But good god is it hard on the soul.
Based on the methodology, this is not really a list of top 100 novels, it's a list of 100 top 10 novels. It's a subtle difference, but I think it introduces a type of bias into the results.
I created a list of all the novels the reviewers ranked (172 people each picked 10 novels) and ranked them all based on just how many times they appeared in the rankings, ignoring the actual ranking.
There is a total of 659 unique novels ranked, and to place in the top 50, it only takes 6 of the 172 reviewers to include it on their list. 3 out of 172 places the novel in top 91-131.
I think anything past the top 50 or so on this list is mostly dominated by noise, there isn't enough data to really separate the novels past that, or make much conclusion about. Many of the novels ranked 100-250 here (which includes most of the books mentioned by the other commenters as missing) could have just as easily ended up in the top 100 with just different sampling.
Edit: fixed some errors and dupes, it's 659 unique novels now - there was actually a significant number of duplicates in the raw data, where either the name of the author or title were spelled differently for the same novel
Edit 2: to illustrate the type of bias I am talking about, here is a list of novels but only including novels ranked #1 on any of the top 10 lists - so this is a list of 92 #1 novels, as opposed to 100 top 10 novels. Many novels from outside the original top 100 now make an appearance due to at least one reviewer granting them the #1 spot on their list, like LotR, while some previously highly ranked novels are gone (e.g. Jane Eyre with 21 votes, but not a single #1) I bet if the reviewers were asked to list 20 or more novels each, the results would be still different. Even using a different weighting based on the top 10 placement would likely shuffle the results significantly, ending up with a different list of 100.
Thank you, I love that you did this!
666 items and Foucault's Pendulum is not among them? What a worthless jury, excuse my candor. Three people did mention The Name of the Rose and there's one Murakami book listed (one I have yet to read), but where is 1Q84?
...Actually, I'd love to see a list made by Tildeians. We might get more obscure, left-field results that are equally worth reading.
I would not have included works that were first published in other languages and then translated into English. That would knock a fair number out of this list.
They weasel-worded it as "published in English" rather than best English language novels as is stated in the title here at Tildes, so they gave themselves wiggle room.
But what do I know? I've only read a handful of these books. Eleven for sure. Don't remember if I ever finished 1984.
1984 is one of those books where if you do actually finish it you will know that its not about what most people think its about.
The real ending is SO dark. The absolute hopelessness of that reality is something thats definitely stuck in my head. I didn’t really get it until I read it again as an adult.
Great Gatsby, Fahrenheit 451, Brave New World, all those hit different as an adult.
I believe one of the most important lessons of 1984 is just how dark it is. People gravitate towards happy endings but the reality 1984 warns against is not some magic victory.
It is one thing I hate about movies. They almost universally wipe away the real ending, replaced with a feelgood.
Which is kinda dystopian in its own right when you think about it.
I keep waffling on my opinion of this approach. On one hand, I completely agree that it feels a little underhanded, though on the other hand, I’m glad that translated works that hold up (decently) are acknowledged too. I’m monolingual and am incredibly grateful that excellent translations of works like Don Quixote and One Hundred Years of Solitude exist, and that lists like this shine a spotlight on them instead of leaving them off because they weren’t originally written in English, otherwise a dunce like me might never have given them the time of day.
I'm torn. On the one hand, that's a pretty logical argument. Hard to disagree with. On the other, translations have had massive effects on not just the English language, but also English writing and English fiction. Even if we put aside Dostoevsky, The Iliad is a translation, you know?
Why not just call it a list of the 100 best novels then? Why include English as a qualifier at all?
I have zero defense against that at all. Haha.
Because not all translations are equal. Some works may not translate well to English at all and some translators may make better translations of works than others. These are the best 100 novels presented in English according to this publisher, not necessarily originally written in English. I'm sure there are some books written in Hindi that are just amazing but fall flat in English and there are certain themes that are so compelling in any language that even as written in English they are rendered among the best works of fiction. Likewise, translation can in and of itself be an art and if a translator is able to convey a writer's intentions extremely well in English and the end result is exceptionally good (like 100 best books ever good) then I don't see any reason why it shouldn't be on this list.
Continuing with your opening line, "Because not all translations are equal", I think a more interesting list could have been made with the goal of highlighting the best translations to English. The 100 best novel translations to English might be very helpful.
Poll foreign authors, scholars, publishers, and the translators themselves, and come up with the most highly regarded translations. Also point out why they are seen as outstanding. I would appreciate this type of effort far more than just another "best novels" list.
Because not all works have been published in English. A great novel written in mandarin but not yet translated would not qualify for this.
They did call it the best novels. “In English” was added as a qualifier only in the submission to tildes, and did not appear in the original article.
It says at the top of the Guardian article "The greatest literature ever published in English, as voted for by authors, critics and academics worldwide. How many have you read?"
Sure, and that makes sense. Presumably the people making the ranking can only read proficiently in English, so the list can only comprise works published in English.
That does not say that the work itself is in English.
You’re right about the “published in English” aspect, as “English-language” was something I added to their original title (which was just “The 100 best novels of all time”).
I edited the title here to fit better with the list’s contents.
Watership Down isn't there?
Lord of the Rings?
Wizard of Oz?
Salem's Lot?
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy?
I call shenanigans.
Watership Down is an utter masterpiece of nested storytelling. The Peter Capaldi audiobook is utterly astonishing, the way he is able to have a distinct voice for each storytelling rabbit, with each rabbit voice doing their own voices in the stories they are telling.
Lord of the Rings is almost unquestioningly the most influental novel in the last 80 years.
Wizard of Oz was declared "America's greatest and best-loved homegrown fairytale" by the Library of Congress.
Stephen King trumped Bram Stoker with Salem's Lot the way Jonny Cash trumped NIN with Hurt.
Hitchhiker's Guide is just a good time and anybody who says otherwise probably deserves what's coming for them.
You had me until your Hurt statement.
Trent Reznor agrees with him, though!
I never know how to feel about these lists. You know I think the methodology here is decent but it also leads to an obvious skew away from genre or really anything niche(I mean, the Left Hand of Darkness was seminal, but is that really the ONLY sci-fi representation here? Unless I missed something), towards the classics, and sometimes towards very high placements of books that I would personally characterize as more "impressive" than "good" (Ulysses, The Man Without Qualities). Speaking of Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften, I always find it slightly stupid to put works in translation on lists like these. It says English in the title, right? Why is the Quixote there? Why Pedro Páramo and One Hundred Years of Solitude and Invisible Cities -- brilliant books no doubt, that are among my personal favorites, but are also works in translation where, somewhat notoriously, their ambiguity and poeticisms often fail to come across in English?
I guess lists like these are best as jumping off points for discussion, but I tend to prefer more personal lists anyway because by attempting to be definitive these come out kinda anonymous.
Anyway I do agree with a lot of these picks in full: Catch 22, Wuthering Heights, the Nabokov stuff (if I'm right in remembering that Nabokov wrote in English and then his family translated it into Russian). All holds up marvelously. I do wonder what more recent novels will be making lists like this in fifty years when they're "eligible." Chain Gang All Stars, maybe. House of Leaves? I mostly read dyke-y genre stuff these days so I'm not hugely tapped in.
I was puzzled by the books in translation. I mean, The Master and Margarita (#66 on this list) is one of my personal favorites, but I wouldn't put it on a list of top novels in English. For Pete's sake, at least tell us which translation deserves the spot, since translation quality and style can vary so much!
Which translation is especially true for The Master and Margarita. There are multiple translations with different strengths and tones. When I decided to read it picking which version took some research.
Which translation did you end up reading ? Were you happy with the choice ?
I've read and still own a Slovak translation, and later also the Ginsburg English translation, but both of those are from 1967, and apparently based on the censored text published in USSR back then.
I loved the book, and would love to revisit one of the more complete uncensored versions again. I can understand Russian fairly OK, but not quite on the level to be able to read a book like this unfortunately.
Kindred from Butler is also in the mix!
Man, what a snooze-fest. Not a single Berenstain Bears book. I read The Great Gatsby, and there wasn't anything great about it. Unbelievable.
I'm a member of the Bearstein Bears' timeline. I blame the shift to the Bearstain Bears timeline for all things that have gone wrong.
I mean there seemed to be some great parties. I for one would go to a great Gatsby party. But I'd probably skip just a plain ol' Gatsby party.
From their how we made it + have your say page:
I sort of understand why lists like this always have to have a handful of boring books on them. I think. Here's what I don't get though: why is it always the ones that are boring in a boring way (In Search of Lost Time, One Hundred Years of Solitude) when there are equally high quality boring works that are boring in an interesting way (Umberto Eco: Foucault's Pendulum, The Name of the Rose)?
And why is there no Murakami when they've included Dostoyevsky, Cervantes, Proust, Kafka, Tolstoy, Ishiguro, Flaubert, Garcia Marquez and other such great "English language" authors? And like others already said, why go "English language" if you're then going to list all your run-of-the mill non-English classics anyway? Why not just "literature"? Maybe give a chance for actual English language authors to appear on a list like this - maybe even someone who hasn't been mentioned 15698309 times on similar lists already? What exactly is the point here?
(Sorry folks, I didn't sleep well and I'm cranky!)
No real answer, but as someone who considers One Hundred Years of Solitude in a whole other class above anything else I've ever read and couldn't tell you a single thing about my experience reading Foucault's Pendulum I find your comment fascinating. We always know about different preferences but rarely see it so starkly shown.
My best guess at an answer is momentum. A book is considered good and so it always comes up when people think about making these lists.
Above anything else you have read, really? :D That's amazing and makes me happy! Are you going to start raving about Mark Twain next or something? (Just another often mentioned writer whose works I can't quite get into, thankfully not on this list though.)
I guess so. I just can't escape the feeling that some people (perhaps a lot of people) say they like the Iliad, or Moby-Dick, or Pride and Prejudice or whatever they think is widely enjoyed by others - not because they really enjoy it, or reading for that matter, but as a signaling device of some sort. And that some books have been riding on that sort of momentum ever since they first got established as a non-controversial mark of.. evolved taste? I'm probably wrong and just salty because I've been so often disappointed.
Also, I haven't read most of what was listed here so who knows how many absolute gems are on it, obscured only by my own ignorance! At least there is one item on there that I truly enjoyed: Rushdie's Midnight's Children.
I've read 16 books that appear on here, Ulysses is my favorite of those so checks out that it's so high up. None of them feel out of place except maybe Rebecca? But even that one I like a lot. The most represented author I've read is Virginia Woolf, I've read 4 of her books that are on the list, and they certainly all belong there!
The critiques in the methodology here are making me feel better about my ignorance of so many of these titles!
In quintiles (starting at 1-20 ending at 81-100), I've heard of, but not necessarily read: 15, 14, 6, 6, and 5 books on the list. Read only 11 (plus a couple more dnf'd).
Blood Meridian is an amazing read if you can stomach it. So is The Road. The quality of the prose is practically otherworldly. But good god is it hard on the soul.