How We Picked the List
By Richard Lacayo

Welcome to the massive, anguished, exalted undertaking that is the ALL TIME 100 books list. The parameters: English language novels published anywhere in the world since 1923, the year that TIME Magazine began, which, before you ask, means that Ulysses (1922) doesn't make the cut. In May, Time.com posted a similar list, of 100 movies picked by our film critics, Richard Corliss and Richard Schickel. This one is chosen by me, Richard Lacayo, and my colleague Lev Grossman, whom we sometimes cite as proof that you don't need to be named Richard to be hired as a critic at TIME, though apparently it helps. Just ask our theater critic, Richard Zoglin.

For the books project, Grossman and I each began by drawing up inventories of our nominees. Once we traded notes, it turned out that more than 80 of our separately chosen titles matched. (Even some of the less well-known ones, like At-Swim Two Birds.) We decided then that we would more or less divide the remaining slots between us. That would allow each of us to include books that the other might not have chosen. Or might not even have read. (Ubik? What's an Ubik?) And that would extend the list into places where mere agreement wouldn't take it.

Even so, there are many titles we couldn't fit here that we're still anguishing over. Djuna Barnes' Nightwood dropped in and out. Aldous Huxley's Point Counter Point hovered for a while at the edges. There were writers we had to admit we love more for their short stories than their novels—Donald Barthelme, Annie Proulx, Flannery O'Connor, Eudora Welty. We could agree that some of Gore Vidal's novels are an essential pleasure, but it's his non-fiction that's essential period. Then there was the intellectual massif of Norman Mailer, indisputably one of the great writers of our time, but his supreme achievements are his headlong reconfigurations of the whole idea of non-fiction, books like Armies of the Night and The Executioner's Song. Dawn Powell, Mordechai Richler, Thomas Wolfe, Peter Carey, J.F. Powers, Mary McCarthy, Edmund White, Larry McMurtry, Katherine Ann Porter, Amy Tan, John Dos Passos, Oscar Hijuelos—we looked over our bookcases and many more than 100 names laid down a claim. This means you, Stephen King.

This project, which got underway in January, was not just a reading effort. It was a re-reading effort. It meant revisiting a lot of novels both of us had not looked into for some time. A few titles that seemed indispensable some years ago turned out on a second tasting to be, well, dispensable. More common was the experience I had with Saul Bellow's Herzog, about a man coming to terms with the disappointments of midlife by directing his questions everywhere. It was one of the first adult novels I attempted in late adolescence. It left its treadmarks on me even then, but this time his experienced heart spoke to me differently.

There were also first time discoveries. Having heard for years that Richard Yates' Revolutionary Road was one of the great but underappreciated American novels, I searched it out. I have spent the months since then pressing it into the hands of anybody who will take it, including yours. Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston's great story of a black woman surviving whatever God and man throws at her, was not part of the required reading list when I was in school. It is now part of my personal canon. Henry Green? Hadn't read Henry Green. Finally read Loving. Loved it.

Lists like this one have two purposes. One is to instruct. The other of course is to enrage. We're bracing ourselves for the e-mails that start out: "You moron! You pathetic bourgeoise insect! How could you have left off...(insert title here)." We say Mrs. Dalloway. You say Mrs. Bridge. We say Naked Lunch. You say Breakfast at Tiffanys. Let's call the whole thing off? Just the opposite—bring it on. Sometimes judgment is best formed under fire. But please, no e-mails about Ulysses. Rules are rules.

A - B
The Adventures of Augie March
Saul Bellow

All the King's Men
Robert Penn Warren


American Pastoral
Philip Roth

An American Tragedy
Theodore Dreiser

Animal Farm
George Orwell

Appointment in Samarra
John O'Hara

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret
Judy Blume

The Assistant
Bernard Malamud

At Swim-Two-Birds
Flann O'Brien

Atonement
Ian McEwan

Beloved
Toni Morrison

The Berlin Stories
Christopher Isherwood

The Big Sleep
Raymond Chandler

The Blind Assassin
Margaret Atwood

Blood Meridian
Cormac McCarthy

Brideshead Revisited
Evelyn Waugh

The Bridge of San Luis Rey
Thornton Wilder

C - D
Call It Sleep
Henry Roth

Catch-22
Joseph Heller

The Catcher in the Rye
J.D. Salinger

A Clockwork Orange
Anthony Burgess

The Confessions of Nat Turner
William Styron

The Corrections
Jonathan Franzen

The Crying of Lot 49
Thomas Pynchon

A Dance to the Music of Time
Anthony Powell

The Day of the Locust
Nathanael West

Death Comes for the Archbishop
Willa Cather

A Death in the Family
James Agee

The Death of the Heart
Elizabeth Bowen

Deliverance
James Dickey

Dog Soldiers
Robert Stone


F - G
Falconer
John Cheever


The French Lieutenant's Woman
John Fowles


The Golden Notebook
Doris Lessing


Go Tell it on the Mountain
James Baldwin


Gone With the Wind
Margaret Mitchell


The Grapes of Wrath
John Steinbeck


Gravity's Rainbow
Thomas Pynchon


The Great Gatsby
F. Scott Fitzgerald


H - I
A Handful of Dust
Evelyn Waugh

The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter
Carson McCullers


The Heart of the Matter
Graham Greene

Herzog
Saul Bellow


Housekeeping
Marilynne Robinson


A House for Mr. Biswas
V.S. Naipaul


I, Claudius
Robert Graves


Infinite Jest
David Foster Wallace

Invisible Man
Ralph Ellison

L - N
Light in August
William Faulkner


The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe
C.S. Lewis

Lolita
Vladimir Nabokov

Lord of the Flies
William Golding

The Lord of the Rings
J.R.R. Tolkien


Loving
Henry Green


Lucky Jim
Kingsley Amis


The Man Who Loved Children
Christina Stead


Midnight's Children
Salman Rushdie

Money
Martin Amis


The Moviegoer
Walker Percy


Mrs. Dalloway
Virginia Woolf

Naked Lunch
William Burroughs


Native Son
Richard Wright


Neuromancer
William Gibson

Never Let Me Go
Kazuo Ishiguro

1984
George Orwell

O - R
On the Road
Jack Kerouac


One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Ken Kesey


The Painted Bird
Jerzy Kosinski

Pale Fire
Vladimir Nabokov


A Passage to India
E.M. Forster

Play It As It Lays
Joan Didion

Portnoy's Complaint
Philip Roth


Possession
A.S. Byatt


The Power and the Glory
Graham Greene

The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
Muriel Spark


Rabbit, Run
John Updike


Ragtime
E.L. Doctorow


The Recognitions
William Gaddis


Red Harvest
Dashiell Hammett

Revolutionary Road
Richard Yates

S - T
The Sheltering Sky
Paul Bowles


Slaughterhouse-Five
Kurt Vonnegut


Snow Crash
Neal Stephenson

The Sot-Weed Factor
John Barth

The Sound and the Fury
William Faulkner

The Sportswriter
Richard Ford


The Spy Who Came in From the Cold
John le Carre


The Sun Also Rises
Ernest Hemingway


Their Eyes Were Watching God
Zora Neale Hurston


Things Fall Apart
Chinua Achebe

To Kill a Mockingbird
Harper Lee


To the Lighthouse
Virginia Woolf

Tropic of Cancer
Henry Miller


U - W
Ubik
Philip K. Dick

Under the Net
Iris Murdoch

Under the Volcano
Malcolm Lowry


Watchmen
Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons

White Noise
Don DeLillo


White Teeth
Zadie Smith


Wide Sargasso Sea
Jean Rhys

Hi. Here's the books I've read on this list:

1. Atonement
2. Gone With the Wind
3. The Grapes of Wrath
4. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter
5. Housekeeping
6. Light in August
7. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe
8. Mrs. Dalloway
9. Their Eyes Were Watching God
10. To Kill a Mockingbird

Only time. I differ with a couple of books on the list. I think I'll start a folder for books we didn't like.

Mary

I got 17 of these......

I've read several and a few are on my to-read list and today I added Loving to my list...I own Infinite Jest and want to tackle it eventually...it's like 1000 pages!
Shelli

Yikes! 1000 pages?

Jill wrote: "Yikes! 1000 pages?"

I know!... and I don't think it's an easy read either, but I'd like to try it as I think David Foster Wallace was an interesting person and his life and death.... so tragic.
Shelli

Hi, here's the books I've read from ths list.

1. Animal Farm
2. Beloved
3. Brideshead Revisited
4. Catcher in the Rye
5. The French Lieutenants Woman
6. one with the Wind
7. The Great Gatsby
8. A Handful of Dust
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
10.Lord of the Flies
11.One Flew over the Cuckoos Nest
12.Revolutionary Road
13.To Kill a Mockingbird
14. White Teeth
15.Wide Sargasso Sea

oops missed some

16. Grapes of Wrath
17. Passage to India
18. Prime ofMiss Jean Brodie

I read three books of the list and I only read them because I had to read them for school.

Does it count to have seen the movie??? Then I can add another four :-)

But I don't mind not having read all the books other people think I should have read because I read for fun and not to compete with others.

Hi Stef. You can count the movie. That would be four. I think it's fun just to read the list to see what other people are reading. i like to see the top book lists from other countries.

mary

I have read six on this list

Angela

I've read 20:

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret (meh)
Beloved (very good)
Blood Meridian (fabulous)
Catch-22 (detested it)
The Catcher in the Rye (detested it)
The French Lieutenant's Woman (okay)
Gone With the Wind (wonderfully entertaining)
The Grapes of Wrath (fabulous)
The Great Gatsby (fabulous)
The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter (meh)
Lolita (fabulous)
Lord of the Flies (very good, but tough read)
The Lord of the Rings (meh)
Slaughterhouse-Five (fabulous)
The Spy Who Came in From the Cold (wonderfully entertaining)
Their Eyes Were Watching God (very good)
Things Fall Ap0art (very good)
To Kill a Mockingbird (fabulous)
Tropic of Cancer (meh)
White Teeth (meh)

I have 13-15 on Mt. TBR (can't remember for sure whether I have two of them or not).

Hi Maggie, I've always heard good reviews of Blood Meridian and as a McCarthy fan, I should really read it.

Also on my high attention list- Slaughterhouse Five.

OK, I am definitely taking those books off the radar and back onto the urgent tbr.

Thanks,

Jill

I have read 22

All the King's Men
Animal Farm
Catch-22
The Catcher in the Rye
A Clockwork Orange
The Day of the Locust
The Death of the Heart
The French Lieutenant's Woman
The Grapes of Wrath
The Great Gatsby
A Handful of Dust
I, Claudius
Light in August
Lord of the Flies
Native Son
1984
On the Road
A Passage to India
The Sun Also Rises
Their Eyes Were Watching God
To Kill a Mockingbird
To the Lighthouse

19 so far. To lazy to list them. ;)

26 so far, like Asa, too lazy to list them...

I'm at 26
Animal Farm (but it's been a long time)
Are you there God, it's me Margaret (see above)
Atonement (really enjoyed it!)
Beloved (good, but not as great as I had heard)
Blood Meridian (I'm a big McCarthy fan)
Catcher in the Rye
The Corrections (I disliked this book very intensely)
Death comes for the Archbishop (I've re-read a few times)
Gone with the wind
Grapes of Wrath (re-read it last year and it was amazing)
The Great Gatsby
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter
Invisible Man
Light in August (I like it, but it's not for everyone)
The Lion, the witch, and the wardrobe
Lord of the Rings
Midnight's Children (One of my top 10 ever)
Never let me go
1984
On the road
The sound and the fury
The sun also rises
Things fall apart
To kill a mockingbird
Tropic of Cancer
White Teeth

I'm amazed and impressed at how many of these I read in high school English. I must have received a better education in school than I thought!
And I need to put Revolutionary Road on my TBR list....

This is a great thread!


I have read these books from the list (with my ratings, should anyone care. LOL!):

1. Animal Farm 3.5 Stars
2. Atonement 4 Stars
3. Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret 4 Stars
4. The Catcher in the Rye 4.5 Stars
5. A Clockwork Orange 3 Stars
6. The Corrections 3 Stars
7. The Grapes of Wrath 5 Stars
8. The Great Gatsby 5 Stars
9. Heart Is a Lonely Hunter 5 Stars
10. Lord of the Flies 4 Stars
11. Lucky Jim 3.5 Stars
12. Mrs Dalloway 3 Stars
13. Naked Lunch The Restored Text 3 Stars
14. Never Let Me Go 4 Stars
15. On The Road 4 Stars
16. Possession 4.5 Stars
17. Ragtime A Novel 4 Stars
18. The Sun Also Rises 5 Stars
19. Their Eyes Were Watching God 5 Stars
20. Things Fall Apart 4.5 Stars
21. To Kill a Mockingbird5 Stars
22. White Teeth 2.5 Stars

There are 39 books on the list that are already in my TBR pile, but now I will probably need to add more. :P

I have read:-

Animal Farm George Orwell
Beloved Toni Morrison
The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe
C.S. Lewis
1984 George Orwell
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest -Ken Kesey
To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee

Only 12 books. I gotta start checking out some of these (a lot of them I actually have been meaning to read too), usually I've read a lot more of the books on lists like these...

1. Animal Farm
2. The Catcher in the Rye
3. A Clockwork Orange
4. The Great Gatsby
5. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
6. Lolita
7. Lord of the Flies
8. Lord of the Rings
9. 1984
10. To Kill a Mockingbird
11. To the Lighthouse
12. Watchmen

Pleasantly surprised that they included a graphic novel on the list, they are grossly underrated in my opinion. And Watchmen truly is great.

I've only read seven from this list and that is probably because I rarely read the books we were supposed to read in school... For a minute I was concerned that the Judy Blume one was the only one I read - and I read that one for fun :)

Anyone else notice there aren't TOO many movies from this list? Usually when I see one of these lists, about 60% are movies and I've usually seen them all...


Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret


Gone With the Wind


The Great Gatsby


The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe


Native Son


On the Road


Watchmen

This is a great list! I've read 11 so far:
1. Animal Farm
2. Beloved
3. The Blind Assassin
4. The Catcher in the Rye
5. Gone with the Wind
6. The Great Gasby
7. Lord of the Flies
8. Midnight's Children
9. On the Road
10. One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest
11. To Kill a Mocking Bird

Well, I didn't read/own as many from this list. Only about 26. However, I read a few more of authors listed, just not the books they picked (of the 91 authors listed, I've read about 31).

It's amazing how different this list is from other "Best 100" lists. I don't fare nearly as well on this list: I've only read 9. Sadly, I can't say that too many of the others are particularly tempting to me either, but maybe I just don't know what I'm missing.

Cynthia wrote: "It's amazing how different this list is from other "Best 100" lists. I don't fare nearly as well on this list: I've only read 9. Sadly, I can't say that too many of the others are particularly t..."

Apparently we're addicts just not part of the literati.

I have read:

Animal Farm George Orwell
Atonement Ian McEwan
The Big Sleep Raymond Chandler
Brideshead Revisited Evelyn Waugh
Catch-22 Joseph Heller (didn't finish)
The Catcher in the Rye J.D. Salinger
The French Lieutenant's Woman John Fowles
Gone With the Wind Margaret Mitchell
The Grapes of Wrath John Steinbeck
A Handful of Dust Evelyn Waugh
I, Claudius Robert Graves
The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe C.S. Lewis
Lolita Vladimir Nabokov
Lord of the Flies William Golding
The Lord of the Rings J.R.R. Tolkien
Never Let Me Go Kazuo Ishiguro
1984 George Orwell
On the Road Jack Kerouac (didn't finish)
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest Ken Kesey
A Passsage to India E.M. Forster
The Power and the Glory Graham Greene
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie Muriel Spark
To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee
To the Lighthouse Virginia Woolf (didn't finish)
Watchmen Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons
Wide Sargasso Sea Jean Rhys

But most of those books I read so long ago it could almost be in another lifetime.