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Books That Changed the World
Books That Changed The The 50 Most Influential Books in Human History tells that here you can see the most influential book such as Iliad, Republic, The Interpretation of Dreams from every field as literature, physics, astronomy, etc. Among these words, mysterious power drives the improvement of human kind with this or that way since thousands of years. The book explains profound theories in simple language, and only some summaries may help little readers grasp its essence.
208 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2008
40 people are currently reading
831 people want to read
About the author
James Andrew Taylor
23 books8 followersCredited as Andrew Taylor on most works.
Andrew Taylor has been a freelance writer since 2004, but he has been working in newspapers, magazines, and television, in both Europe and the Middle East, for nearly 35 years. Before that, so long ago that he can hardly remember, he read English at Oxford University.
After training on the Yorkshire Evening Post, in Leeds, he worked as a political journalist for the Press Association and the Daily Express in the House of Commons, Westminster, and then went to BBC Television News as a national news reporter. From there, he travelled to Dubai to work as a news editor, news reporter, news reader, and news-everything-else for Dubai Television (DTV) for five years, and then came back to England to run DTV’s London office.
He began writing books in the early 1990s. Then after being made redundant in a major reorganisation of DTV – an experience he later wrote about in Burning the Suit – he established himself in freelance writing and journalism.
Andrew Taylor has been a freelance writer since 2004, but he has been working in newspapers, magazines, and television, in both Europe and the Middle East, for nearly 35 years. Before that, so long ago that he can hardly remember, he read English at Oxford University.
After training on the Yorkshire Evening Post, in Leeds, he worked as a political journalist for the Press Association and the Daily Express in the House of Commons, Westminster, and then went to BBC Television News as a national news reporter. From there, he travelled to Dubai to work as a news editor, news reporter, news reader, and news-everything-else for Dubai Television (DTV) for five years, and then came back to England to run DTV’s London office.
He began writing books in the early 1990s. Then after being made redundant in a major reorganisation of DTV – an experience he later wrote about in Burning the Suit – he established himself in freelance writing and journalism.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 56 reviews
January 7, 2015
This is a really interesting book, and pulls together a very solid collection of influential reads throughout history. Some I agreed with, and others not so much. I was a bit confounded at why some books were included while others weren't, and how some books made the list in place of others.
I loved the Greek and Roman history, although at one point it felt a bit repetitive - Homer, Herodotus, Plato, Horace etc. I wasn't too fond that instead of going by his actual name Ibn Sina he went with Avicenna. Some books I hadn't really heard of and I was a bit confused as to why he included them such as the Sorrows of Young Werther and Lyrical Ballads, and I definitely wasn't a fan of all the economy books, but all in all I appreciated the effort.
I was a little surprised he included Harry Potter on there and not Lord of the Rings. I didn't think he needed to put in the Atlas and Geographia, but I did like the Dictionary and the Telephone Directory being on there because you wouldn't expect them to be.
An interesting read to say the least.
I loved the Greek and Roman history, although at one point it felt a bit repetitive - Homer, Herodotus, Plato, Horace etc. I wasn't too fond that instead of going by his actual name Ibn Sina he went with Avicenna. Some books I hadn't really heard of and I was a bit confused as to why he included them such as the Sorrows of Young Werther and Lyrical Ballads, and I definitely wasn't a fan of all the economy books, but all in all I appreciated the effort.
I was a little surprised he included Harry Potter on there and not Lord of the Rings. I didn't think he needed to put in the Atlas and Geographia, but I did like the Dictionary and the Telephone Directory being on there because you wouldn't expect them to be.
An interesting read to say the least.
April 2, 2018
Read this for a university project about the power of the written word and the impact it's had on society, economy, politics, religion etc., and I've been looking into lots of different texts from different eras to see the ways they have altered our world and whether the world would be the same without print (novels, posters, leaflets etc). This was a really helpful addition to my research and I have dog-eared it, sticky tabbed it and annotated it and I'm looking forward to referring back to it to draw the information from it. This is a great read regardless of whether you're reading it for pleasure or for research - I enjoyed reading this and I learned a lot from it. I've definitely added a good chunk of knowledge to my repertoire thanks to this!
December 30, 2017
Impressive list with which I would mostly agree. But... are the spoilers necessary?
July 13, 2015
Andrew Taylor is a British author who was born in Stevenage, England on 14 October 1951. He is best known for his crime novels, which include the Lydmouth series, the Roth Trilogy and historical novels such as the best-selling The American Boy and The Anatomy of Ghosts. Taylor has been nominated for several prizes and had won many more including the Cartier Diamond Dagger, CWA New Blood Dagger, the Martin Beck Award and CWA Ellis Peters Historical Dagger Award. So when a writer of this calibre produces Books That Changed The World, I take notice of his opinion. It is particularly useful now that I have taken over leading the local book group from my friend, the respected author, Evelyn Hood. What a set of shoes to fill!
So, in Books that Changed the World Andrew Taylor sets himself the task of choosing and profiling the fifty most important and influential books in the history of the world. He has selected books from every field of human creativity and intellectual endeavour and covers genres from poetry to politics, fiction to philosophy, theology to anthropology, and economics to physics. In doing so the author has created a rounded and satisfying picture of how fifty towering achievements of the human intellect that have been important to building societies, shaping values, enhancing understanding of the world, enabling technological advancements, and reflecting concerns and dilemmas, strengths and failings.
Andrew Taylor sets each work and its author firmly in historical context, summarizes the content of the work in a series of engaging and lively essays. He also questions, and explores the works wider influence and legacy. Books that Changed the World is a fascinating and informative read.
None of the inclusions will really surprise the reader. Of course, they include The Bible and The Qur’ran, I was not surprised to see Quotations from Chairman Mao included too. The inclusion of the Telephone Directory amused me as I do not consider it a book, as such I suppose Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary of the English Language also falls into this observation. However, their significance cannot be denied. I agreed with the inclusions of Charles Darwin’s Of The Origin of Species and The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money by John Maynard Keynes. There is also no dispute about the First Folio of William Shakespeare’s plays nor the Poems of Wilfred Owen, War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy or The Catcher in the Rye by J.D.Salinger. However, I was surprised to see reference to J K Rowling’s Harry Potter, but not the Tolkien’s The Hobbit and Silent Spring by Rachel Carson but not Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet.
However, I am really not complaining. It was wonderful to have the opportunity to delve deeper into the library of great books, Books that Changed the World is a thought-provoking and stimulating read, and the likely cause of many an impassioned debate in book clubs and beyond. I highly recommend it.
So, in Books that Changed the World Andrew Taylor sets himself the task of choosing and profiling the fifty most important and influential books in the history of the world. He has selected books from every field of human creativity and intellectual endeavour and covers genres from poetry to politics, fiction to philosophy, theology to anthropology, and economics to physics. In doing so the author has created a rounded and satisfying picture of how fifty towering achievements of the human intellect that have been important to building societies, shaping values, enhancing understanding of the world, enabling technological advancements, and reflecting concerns and dilemmas, strengths and failings.
Andrew Taylor sets each work and its author firmly in historical context, summarizes the content of the work in a series of engaging and lively essays. He also questions, and explores the works wider influence and legacy. Books that Changed the World is a fascinating and informative read.
None of the inclusions will really surprise the reader. Of course, they include The Bible and The Qur’ran, I was not surprised to see Quotations from Chairman Mao included too. The inclusion of the Telephone Directory amused me as I do not consider it a book, as such I suppose Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary of the English Language also falls into this observation. However, their significance cannot be denied. I agreed with the inclusions of Charles Darwin’s Of The Origin of Species and The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money by John Maynard Keynes. There is also no dispute about the First Folio of William Shakespeare’s plays nor the Poems of Wilfred Owen, War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy or The Catcher in the Rye by J.D.Salinger. However, I was surprised to see reference to J K Rowling’s Harry Potter, but not the Tolkien’s The Hobbit and Silent Spring by Rachel Carson but not Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet.
However, I am really not complaining. It was wonderful to have the opportunity to delve deeper into the library of great books, Books that Changed the World is a thought-provoking and stimulating read, and the likely cause of many an impassioned debate in book clubs and beyond. I highly recommend it.
April 12, 2014
As Taylor points out in his introduction, any list of “significant” books which might be considered to have influenced the development of the World, would invariably give rise to argumentation and debate. Taylor admits that different people would insist on other inclusions, but he decides what he believes to be the 50 most influential books. And to be fair, he does a reasonable job of at least making the reader aware of wider interests than just literature as such.
Taylor manages to cover quite a range in his choice of books: literature, yes, but also science, medicine, politics, propaganda, biology, social sciences, etc. The title, author and significance of the particular work are provided in easy to read potted summaries, occasionally including excerpts from the works cited. Obviously, in covering 50 works in little over 300 pages, one should not assume that one is going to get any detailed analysis; but Taylor does give his reasons for his choices, and often enough includes cross-references which an attentive reader will appreciate (and might also explain why certain works were included).
One should also be aware that, apart from a few references to other cultures, most of the entries relate to Western writings, and the influence, especially in the last few centuries, when such works were eventually translated into English. The entries, however, are provided in chronological order, and Taylor is not so foolish as to intimate that they influenced only the West. The value to Western readers is that the list provides the interested person to follow up any particular subject with comparative ease, if so desired.
In general, this is an eclectic and easily accessible introduction to a number of important texts which, for better or for worse, have played significant roles in the thinking and actions of much of humanity throughout our history.
Taylor manages to cover quite a range in his choice of books: literature, yes, but also science, medicine, politics, propaganda, biology, social sciences, etc. The title, author and significance of the particular work are provided in easy to read potted summaries, occasionally including excerpts from the works cited. Obviously, in covering 50 works in little over 300 pages, one should not assume that one is going to get any detailed analysis; but Taylor does give his reasons for his choices, and often enough includes cross-references which an attentive reader will appreciate (and might also explain why certain works were included).
One should also be aware that, apart from a few references to other cultures, most of the entries relate to Western writings, and the influence, especially in the last few centuries, when such works were eventually translated into English. The entries, however, are provided in chronological order, and Taylor is not so foolish as to intimate that they influenced only the West. The value to Western readers is that the list provides the interested person to follow up any particular subject with comparative ease, if so desired.
In general, this is an eclectic and easily accessible introduction to a number of important texts which, for better or for worse, have played significant roles in the thinking and actions of much of humanity throughout our history.
September 14, 2016
An interesting collection and thoughtful inclusions (and, one has to assume, exclusions) to this list of 50 influential books. Naturally, the MOST influential books in the world's history can never be quantified, only qualitatively proposed. However, I think the collator's justifications for his list were pretty sound. I was personally delighted to see The Collected Poems of Wilfred Owen included as both influential in the more clear-eyed view of war that underpinned the pacifist movement and as an outstandingly talented poet. As he died at 20 and left only one slim volume of poetry what could he have written had he lived? For me, that triste thought applies to a number of exceptionally talented artists who died young in that war or in the influenza epidemic that followed - Egon Schiele being another.
But I digress.......at which I am so skilled in doing! Worth a read. If you think there are books that have been missed out - or SHOULD have been omitted, I'd be very interested to discuss it! You can find his list here http://www.greaterbooks.com/taylor.html
But I digress.......at which I am so skilled in doing! Worth a read. If you think there are books that have been missed out - or SHOULD have been omitted, I'd be very interested to discuss it! You can find his list here http://www.greaterbooks.com/taylor.html
June 7, 2014
I can imagine that any list of the books which changed the world is going to produce different reactions in every reader. I found this book an interesting read as it does more than just give information about the book itself but also attempts to explain how and why each book produced major changes.
Here are the books you might expect to find in any list like this: Einstein on relativity and Darwin on the origin of the species; the Bible and the Koran; Freud on the interpretation of dreams and Primo Levi on surviving concentration camps; De Beauvoir's The Second Sex and James Joyce's 'Ulysses' - not to speak of Austen's 'Pride and Prejudice' and Dickens' 'A Christmas Carol'.
With many of the fifty books I found myself nodding in agreement but with others I was questioning why this book and this author instead of others? Why Primo Levi and not Viktor Frankl? Why Freud and not Jung? Surely it was the telephone itself which had the effect on communications and not the first telephone directory itself?
This is a thought provoking read and perhaps one for book clubs to consider as I could imagine it might well produce a lot of discussion on which books should have been excluded from or included in the definitive list of the fifty books with the most influence on the world. I received a free copy of this book for review purposes.
Here are the books you might expect to find in any list like this: Einstein on relativity and Darwin on the origin of the species; the Bible and the Koran; Freud on the interpretation of dreams and Primo Levi on surviving concentration camps; De Beauvoir's The Second Sex and James Joyce's 'Ulysses' - not to speak of Austen's 'Pride and Prejudice' and Dickens' 'A Christmas Carol'.
With many of the fifty books I found myself nodding in agreement but with others I was questioning why this book and this author instead of others? Why Primo Levi and not Viktor Frankl? Why Freud and not Jung? Surely it was the telephone itself which had the effect on communications and not the first telephone directory itself?
This is a thought provoking read and perhaps one for book clubs to consider as I could imagine it might well produce a lot of discussion on which books should have been excluded from or included in the definitive list of the fifty books with the most influence on the world. I received a free copy of this book for review purposes.
March 21, 2014
A wonderful book for any bibliophile! Andrew Taylor tells the always fascinating stories of the 50 books he considers have been the most influential in our history, from the beginning of written literature to the present. From poetry to philosophy, physics to politics – not ignoring the first Phone Book, which is a volume I would never have thought of as being influential, but, apparently is! – he explores how books have shaped our world. Of course, it’s a subjective selection – how could it be anything else? But that’s the joy of books like this, or indeed of any list of books. Each reader will agree or disagree or bridle or applaud – but above all think and consider and learn. I did all those things, and this is a book that I will no doubt dip into on many future occasions.
April 1, 2009
I took this out of the library more because I wanted to see what the 50 book are rather than to read it from cover to cover. I doubt I will read it all the way through but I have dipped in and out of it, reading bits that catch my eye.
Of course, the 50 most influential books are going to be subjective. I was intrigued by this selection and on the most part, agreed with it. I think the one people will find most surprising is the Telephone Directory. I think this was an inspired choice - one that I would not have thought of in a million years and yet makes so much sense. I had never really thought about how I take the directory for advantage before.
Most of the other choices were obvious - The Bible, the Qu'ran, Dictionary, Communist Manifesto, Uncle Tom's Cabin, The Interpretation of Dreams and so on.
One I would possibly disagree with is Harry Potter - I know it sold a ridiculous amount but whether it has changed the world...hmmm...I'm not so sure. It is difficult to have such a modern one in such a book - only time will tell.
Of course, the 50 most influential books are going to be subjective. I was intrigued by this selection and on the most part, agreed with it. I think the one people will find most surprising is the Telephone Directory. I think this was an inspired choice - one that I would not have thought of in a million years and yet makes so much sense. I had never really thought about how I take the directory for advantage before.
Most of the other choices were obvious - The Bible, the Qu'ran, Dictionary, Communist Manifesto, Uncle Tom's Cabin, The Interpretation of Dreams and so on.
One I would possibly disagree with is Harry Potter - I know it sold a ridiculous amount but whether it has changed the world...hmmm...I'm not so sure. It is difficult to have such a modern one in such a book - only time will tell.
August 23, 2014
Fascinating book. How many had I read? About 12-15 of them. How many had I heard of? 48, I think. But I learnt something new about all of them, and the choices themselves were very revealing. I'm sure other people (and certainly other nationalities) would query the choices. No Brecht? And in terms of books that changed the world (although not, of course, for the better) where is Mein Kampf?
Sure to provoke plenty of discussion, I really enjoyed this.
Sure to provoke plenty of discussion, I really enjoyed this.
January 17, 2018
Short write-ups about 50 major books, most of which I'm now old enough to know I will never read. The entries are not especially engaging, certainly nothing got pushed up my must-read list based on what is written here. An OK time-killer when you don't have time to get immersed in a more sustained book.
September 10, 2018
Pikakelauksella läpi kirjallisuuden historian merkkiteoksia. Yhdestä kirjasta kiinnostuin niin paljon, että taidan sen lainata kirjastosta. Ja yhden kirjan oli itse lukenut kokonaan ja toisesta pätkiä.
Tämä kirja oli ensimmäinen laatuan minulla: kirja, jossa on listattu 50 maailman x asiaa. En täysin tyrmää muotoa tämän perusteella, mutta en ihastunut ikiajoiksikaan tähän kirjatyyppiin.
Tämä kirja oli ensimmäinen laatuan minulla: kirja, jossa on listattu 50 maailman x asiaa. En täysin tyrmää muotoa tämän perusteella, mutta en ihastunut ikiajoiksikaan tähän kirjatyyppiin.
November 30, 2014
And one that didn't. Short overview of the contents of each, with an even shorter analysis of how each changed the world. The Bible? OK. Catcher in the Rye? Um...
June 1, 2023
In Andrew Taylor's book, 50 Books That Changed the World, he lists and describes what he believes are the 50 most influential books in human history. The important word to note is influential. Readers may not agree with the books he chose to write about in the sense that maybe they may not like a book, but one cannot disagree that the books listed did not influence humanity in one way or the other. There may be other books that a reader may want to add to the list or switch out, but the way in which Taylor explained the impact that each book had on societies when they were published has me convinced that these books did indeed change something in the world.
My reading experience is not expansive or diverse enough to know off the top of my head what should be added, but I appreciate the overview and summary of each book along with what was happening in the place where a book was published and how it impacted that place. There were many books in his list that I have not read, and there are spoilers as he describes not only the plots of books, but he also tells how a book ends. This is fine with the books on science, and nonfiction, but for the literature maybe I wouldn't have wanted to know the ending. I'm not complaining about this though as I think his main audience was intended for people who may have already read many of these books or are more interested in the historical influences.
As I mentioned, I have not read many of these books. In fact, I've read about four of them, and four others I have only read a portion of. I was familiar with the titles of many of the books because they are famous or infamous like Quotations from Chairman Mao, or literally changed the world like, On the Origin of Species by Darwin and Relativity: The Special and General Theory by Albert Einstein. I've never read any of those books but I am aware of them especially Origin of Species as I did go to school.
The book titles include works that influenced science and mathematics like Canon of Medicine by Avicenna and Principia Mathematica by Issac Newton. Also religious texts like the Bible and the Qur'an. There are titles that changed politics and economy like The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith and The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money by John Maynard Keynes. There are also literary and poetic works that made on impact on societies either through never having been written in a certain form before like Shakespeare's First Folio and James Joyce's Ulysses or it was shocking or obscene for the time period like Ulysses and Lady Chatterley's Lover by D.H. Lawrence. There are also books that had a negative impact on the world like The Protocols of the Elders of Zion (writer unknown) with its anti-Semitism that influenced other books like Hitler's Mein Kampf.
Overall I found it interesting. A book lover or book nerd's book. A lot like when a movie lover gushes over Citizen Kane. New viewers today that don't take much interest in the history of film may find the movie boring, but for the movie buff its exciting; understanding that nothing like this was ever made before that time, and it was something incredible for the audience, and spawned many new directors, and made way for a new way of movie making. That's what these books are like. Today, some of them may have lost a lot of what they once held, but for the audiences of the times, they were world changing.
My reading experience is not expansive or diverse enough to know off the top of my head what should be added, but I appreciate the overview and summary of each book along with what was happening in the place where a book was published and how it impacted that place. There were many books in his list that I have not read, and there are spoilers as he describes not only the plots of books, but he also tells how a book ends. This is fine with the books on science, and nonfiction, but for the literature maybe I wouldn't have wanted to know the ending. I'm not complaining about this though as I think his main audience was intended for people who may have already read many of these books or are more interested in the historical influences.
As I mentioned, I have not read many of these books. In fact, I've read about four of them, and four others I have only read a portion of. I was familiar with the titles of many of the books because they are famous or infamous like Quotations from Chairman Mao, or literally changed the world like, On the Origin of Species by Darwin and Relativity: The Special and General Theory by Albert Einstein. I've never read any of those books but I am aware of them especially Origin of Species as I did go to school.
The book titles include works that influenced science and mathematics like Canon of Medicine by Avicenna and Principia Mathematica by Issac Newton. Also religious texts like the Bible and the Qur'an. There are titles that changed politics and economy like The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith and The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money by John Maynard Keynes. There are also literary and poetic works that made on impact on societies either through never having been written in a certain form before like Shakespeare's First Folio and James Joyce's Ulysses or it was shocking or obscene for the time period like Ulysses and Lady Chatterley's Lover by D.H. Lawrence. There are also books that had a negative impact on the world like The Protocols of the Elders of Zion (writer unknown) with its anti-Semitism that influenced other books like Hitler's Mein Kampf.
Overall I found it interesting. A book lover or book nerd's book. A lot like when a movie lover gushes over Citizen Kane. New viewers today that don't take much interest in the history of film may find the movie boring, but for the movie buff its exciting; understanding that nothing like this was ever made before that time, and it was something incredible for the audience, and spawned many new directors, and made way for a new way of movie making. That's what these books are like. Today, some of them may have lost a lot of what they once held, but for the audiences of the times, they were world changing.
April 27, 2020
Ihan kiintoisa vilkaisu useaan kuuluisaan tai vaikutusvaltaiseen teokseen historian varrelta. Toki kun pyritään esittelemään 50 teosta ja pohtimaan niiden vaikutusta ja meriittejä, ei hirveän syvälle kaikkien kohdalla päästä. Se onkin teoksen sekä hyvä että huono puoli. Teokset, jotka lukijaa itseään kiinnostaisivat enemmänkin, tuntuvat jäävän pintaraapaisuiksi, mutta toisaalta niistä vähemmän kiinnostavistakin jaksaa hyvin lukea muutaman sivun tuntematta tarvetta hyppiä eteenpäin. Ja jokainenhan voi tutustua kiinnostaviin teoksiin tarkemmin jälkikäteen.
Kaikista teosvalinnoista en tietenkään ole samaa mieltä eikä kaikkien teosten kohdalla mielestäni pystytä perustelemaan niiden oikeutta esiintyä ”maailmaa muuttaneena kirjana”. Toisaalta meistä jokainen kokoaisi hieman (tai erittäin) erilaisen listan kuin kaikki muut eli ei ole realistista odottaa, että kaikki valinnat kävisivät lukijan omaan järkeen. Enimmäkseen pidän kuitenkin valintoja ihan perusteltuina.
Sen sijaan vaikeampaa on antaa anteeksi kirjaa riivaavat lukuisat kirjoitusvirheet. Niitä esiintyy lähes joka sivulla, joillain sivuilla useita (virheitä nimien oikeinkirjoituksessa, epäloogisuuksia vuosiluvuissa, ihan vain lyöntivirheitä...). Tämä riepoi aika tavalla ja vaikeutti tekstiin uppoutumista. Tekstissä oli muutenkin jonkin verran vaikealukuisuutta ja raskaiden lauserakenteiden aiheuttamaa kömpelyyttä, mistä syystä välillä virkkeitä piti tavata pari kertaa ennen kuin niiden merkitys kirkastui. Sitä en osaa sanoa, vaivaako tämä ongelma myös alkukielistä teosta vai vain suomennosta. Tämä kirja käy hyvänä esimerkkinä siitä, miten harmillista on, ettei viimeistelyyn ja oikolukuun ehditä/haluta enää aina panostaa. Kirjan tekemisessä ja kääntämisessäkin on ollut suuri työ, jota kirjan ostaja ja lukija pääsisi paremmin arvostamaan, kun kieliasukin olisi huoliteltu.
Kaikista teosvalinnoista en tietenkään ole samaa mieltä eikä kaikkien teosten kohdalla mielestäni pystytä perustelemaan niiden oikeutta esiintyä ”maailmaa muuttaneena kirjana”. Toisaalta meistä jokainen kokoaisi hieman (tai erittäin) erilaisen listan kuin kaikki muut eli ei ole realistista odottaa, että kaikki valinnat kävisivät lukijan omaan järkeen. Enimmäkseen pidän kuitenkin valintoja ihan perusteltuina.
Sen sijaan vaikeampaa on antaa anteeksi kirjaa riivaavat lukuisat kirjoitusvirheet. Niitä esiintyy lähes joka sivulla, joillain sivuilla useita (virheitä nimien oikeinkirjoituksessa, epäloogisuuksia vuosiluvuissa, ihan vain lyöntivirheitä...). Tämä riepoi aika tavalla ja vaikeutti tekstiin uppoutumista. Tekstissä oli muutenkin jonkin verran vaikealukuisuutta ja raskaiden lauserakenteiden aiheuttamaa kömpelyyttä, mistä syystä välillä virkkeitä piti tavata pari kertaa ennen kuin niiden merkitys kirkastui. Sitä en osaa sanoa, vaivaako tämä ongelma myös alkukielistä teosta vai vain suomennosta. Tämä kirja käy hyvänä esimerkkinä siitä, miten harmillista on, ettei viimeistelyyn ja oikolukuun ehditä/haluta enää aina panostaa. Kirjan tekemisessä ja kääntämisessäkin on ollut suuri työ, jota kirjan ostaja ja lukija pääsisi paremmin arvostamaan, kun kieliasukin olisi huoliteltu.
September 20, 2015
Originally published on Unravellations.
I'm not sure what made me pick up this book, so different as it is from my usual reading. However, it wasn't a bad choice at all. Books That Changed The World is basically a comprehensive list of books that have asserted a great influence on thought and literature, and Andrew Taylor also provides concise and relevant background information regarding the time period and culture that the book was written and published in. He does not center his list around books of literary importance, also including those of scientific, philosophical and political importance.
I like that he also disclaimed in his introduction that this list was, of course, subjective and that it was his own take of what were the most influential books in history. If this disclaimer had been missing, I would have things to say about the subjectivity and Eurocentric view of history the book posits. In any case, he also provides evidence of the influence that each book enjoys and how it has altered humans' way of thinking over time.
Confession: I did skip past certain books that I wasn't interested in, particularly the ones on economics but also some others. Nevertheless, I gleaned plenty of interesting facts and cleared up some of my own misconceptions about certain books (especially the Greco-Roman classics which I am very unfamiliar with) along the way. For example, I never knew that the Kama Sutra was actually an unillustrated volume of text, and much like the rest of the world, I had thought it only to be some kind of kinky sex manual. I was enlightened on this point. I did not know also that before William Harvey's groundbreaking work on hemology, men thought that an infinite supply of blood was made from the liver. I also learned that William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge paved the way for poetry as it is written today, an intimate way of looking at human experience, and that before Lyrical Ballads was published, poetry were usually story-like epics dealing with philosophy, religion or history, such as in Iliad or Paradise Lost.
The only complaint that I have, I guess, isn't really much of a complaint - I was spoiled for Madame Bovary before I even read it! :( If there are any books on the list that you have yet to read and want to remain un-spoilt, I would recommend that you skip its relevant chapter in this book. Taylor provides a short synopsis of each book's plot, which may reveal important plot points.
Contents:
1. Homer - Iliad (c. 8th century)
2. Herodotus - The Histories (c. 5th century BC)
3. Confucius - The Analects (5th century BC)
4. Plato - The Republic (4th century BC)
5. The Bible (2nd century BC - 2nd century AD)
6. Horace - Odes (23 - 13 BC)
7. Ptolemy - Geographia (c. AD 100 - 170)
8. Mallanaga Vatsyayana - Kama Sutra (2nd or 3rd century AD)
9. The Qu'ran (7th century)
10. Avicenna - Canon of Medicine (1025)
11. Geoffrey Chaucer - The Canterbury Tales (1380s-90s)
12. Niccolo Machiavelli - The Prince (1532)
13. Gerard Mercator - Atlas, or, Cosmographic Meditations (1585-95)
14. Miguel de Cervantes - Don Quixote (1605-15)
15. William Shakespeare - First Folio (1623)
16. William Harvey - An Anatomical Study of the Motion of the Heart and Blood in Animals (1628)
17. Galileo Galilei - Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems (1632)
18. Isaac Newton - Principia mathematica (1687)
19. Samuel Johnson - A Dictionary of the English Language (1755)
20. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe - The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774)
21. Adam Smith - The Wealth of Nations (1776)
22. Thomas Paine - Common Sense (1776)
23. William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Lyrical Ballads (1798)
24. Jane Austen - Pride and Prejudice (1813)
25. Charles Dickens - A Christmas Carol (1843)
26. Karl Marx - The Communist Manifesto (1848)
27. Herman Melville - Moby-Dick (1851)
28. Harriet Beecher Stowe - Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852)
30. Gustave Flaubert - Madame Bovary (1857)
31. Charles Darwin - On the Origin of Species (1859)
32. John Stuart Mill - On Liberty (1859)
33. Leo Tolstoy - War and Peace (1869)
34. New Haven District Telephone Company - The Telephone Directory (1878)
35. Sir Richard Burton (translator) - The Thousand and One Nights (1885)
36. Arthur Conan Doyle - A Study in Scarlet (1888)
37. Sigmund Freud - The Interpretation of Dreams (1899)
38. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion (1905)
39. Wilfred Owen - Poems (1920)
40. Albert Einstein - Relativity: The Special and the General Theory (1920)
41. James Joyce - Ulysses (1922)
42. D. H. Lawrence - Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)
43. John Maynard Keynes - The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money (1936)
44. Primo Levi - If This is a Man (1947)
45. George Orwell - Nineteen Eighty-four (1949)
46. Simone de Beauvoir - The Second Sex (1949)
47. J. D. Salinger - The Catcher In The Rye (1951)
48. Chinua Achebe - Things Fall Apart (1958)
49. Rachel Carson - Silent Spring (1962)
50. Mao Zhedong - Quotations from Chairman Mao (1964)
51. J. K. Rowling - Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (1997)
One thing that I realised from reading this book, however, is that there is usually great resistance and controversy whenever a new revelation is made that contradicts everything that people at that time thought to be true, as in the case of medical experts denouncing William Harvey for his discovery of the way blood is circulated, or the Catholic Church's anger and rejection of Galileo's heliocentric theories on astronomy, or even the ban on D. H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterley's Lover, the overturning of which paving the way for the modern attitude to sexual openness.
It makes me question the things that we consider "controversial" and defying reason in our time and age. Would they one day also become known as works of genius or progressive thought, and the rest of us derided by posterity for our backward thinking?
I'm not sure what made me pick up this book, so different as it is from my usual reading. However, it wasn't a bad choice at all. Books That Changed The World is basically a comprehensive list of books that have asserted a great influence on thought and literature, and Andrew Taylor also provides concise and relevant background information regarding the time period and culture that the book was written and published in. He does not center his list around books of literary importance, also including those of scientific, philosophical and political importance.
I like that he also disclaimed in his introduction that this list was, of course, subjective and that it was his own take of what were the most influential books in history. If this disclaimer had been missing, I would have things to say about the subjectivity and Eurocentric view of history the book posits. In any case, he also provides evidence of the influence that each book enjoys and how it has altered humans' way of thinking over time.
Confession: I did skip past certain books that I wasn't interested in, particularly the ones on economics but also some others. Nevertheless, I gleaned plenty of interesting facts and cleared up some of my own misconceptions about certain books (especially the Greco-Roman classics which I am very unfamiliar with) along the way. For example, I never knew that the Kama Sutra was actually an unillustrated volume of text, and much like the rest of the world, I had thought it only to be some kind of kinky sex manual. I was enlightened on this point. I did not know also that before William Harvey's groundbreaking work on hemology, men thought that an infinite supply of blood was made from the liver. I also learned that William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge paved the way for poetry as it is written today, an intimate way of looking at human experience, and that before Lyrical Ballads was published, poetry were usually story-like epics dealing with philosophy, religion or history, such as in Iliad or Paradise Lost.
The only complaint that I have, I guess, isn't really much of a complaint - I was spoiled for Madame Bovary before I even read it! :( If there are any books on the list that you have yet to read and want to remain un-spoilt, I would recommend that you skip its relevant chapter in this book. Taylor provides a short synopsis of each book's plot, which may reveal important plot points.
Contents:
1. Homer - Iliad (c. 8th century)
2. Herodotus - The Histories (c. 5th century BC)
3. Confucius - The Analects (5th century BC)
4. Plato - The Republic (4th century BC)
5. The Bible (2nd century BC - 2nd century AD)
6. Horace - Odes (23 - 13 BC)
7. Ptolemy - Geographia (c. AD 100 - 170)
8. Mallanaga Vatsyayana - Kama Sutra (2nd or 3rd century AD)
9. The Qu'ran (7th century)
10. Avicenna - Canon of Medicine (1025)
11. Geoffrey Chaucer - The Canterbury Tales (1380s-90s)
12. Niccolo Machiavelli - The Prince (1532)
13. Gerard Mercator - Atlas, or, Cosmographic Meditations (1585-95)
14. Miguel de Cervantes - Don Quixote (1605-15)
15. William Shakespeare - First Folio (1623)
16. William Harvey - An Anatomical Study of the Motion of the Heart and Blood in Animals (1628)
17. Galileo Galilei - Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems (1632)
18. Isaac Newton - Principia mathematica (1687)
19. Samuel Johnson - A Dictionary of the English Language (1755)
20. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe - The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774)
21. Adam Smith - The Wealth of Nations (1776)
22. Thomas Paine - Common Sense (1776)
23. William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Lyrical Ballads (1798)
24. Jane Austen - Pride and Prejudice (1813)
25. Charles Dickens - A Christmas Carol (1843)
26. Karl Marx - The Communist Manifesto (1848)
27. Herman Melville - Moby-Dick (1851)
28. Harriet Beecher Stowe - Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852)
30. Gustave Flaubert - Madame Bovary (1857)
31. Charles Darwin - On the Origin of Species (1859)
32. John Stuart Mill - On Liberty (1859)
33. Leo Tolstoy - War and Peace (1869)
34. New Haven District Telephone Company - The Telephone Directory (1878)
35. Sir Richard Burton (translator) - The Thousand and One Nights (1885)
36. Arthur Conan Doyle - A Study in Scarlet (1888)
37. Sigmund Freud - The Interpretation of Dreams (1899)
38. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion (1905)
39. Wilfred Owen - Poems (1920)
40. Albert Einstein - Relativity: The Special and the General Theory (1920)
41. James Joyce - Ulysses (1922)
42. D. H. Lawrence - Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)
43. John Maynard Keynes - The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money (1936)
44. Primo Levi - If This is a Man (1947)
45. George Orwell - Nineteen Eighty-four (1949)
46. Simone de Beauvoir - The Second Sex (1949)
47. J. D. Salinger - The Catcher In The Rye (1951)
48. Chinua Achebe - Things Fall Apart (1958)
49. Rachel Carson - Silent Spring (1962)
50. Mao Zhedong - Quotations from Chairman Mao (1964)
51. J. K. Rowling - Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (1997)
One thing that I realised from reading this book, however, is that there is usually great resistance and controversy whenever a new revelation is made that contradicts everything that people at that time thought to be true, as in the case of medical experts denouncing William Harvey for his discovery of the way blood is circulated, or the Catholic Church's anger and rejection of Galileo's heliocentric theories on astronomy, or even the ban on D. H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterley's Lover, the overturning of which paving the way for the modern attitude to sexual openness.
It makes me question the things that we consider "controversial" and defying reason in our time and age. Would they one day also become known as works of genius or progressive thought, and the rest of us derided by posterity for our backward thinking?
April 12, 2023
Between December and March I had *twice* seen Goethe's "The Sorrows of Young Werther" alluded to in different tech/psychology books I've read (ftr: Attention Span by Gloria Mark and Digital Madness by Nicholas Kardaras), though it's not one I'd heard about before that. Both authors used it as an example of a social contagion effect well before the rise of modern social media. Specifically, it was a book that was believed to inspire a number of young males to commit suicide in the late 18th century. So I typed it into the local library catalogue and this title popped up, and in fact, The Sorrows of Young Werther is mentioned in the list of these books because of the social contagion effect and because it was one of the early works in the Romanticism genre (see also: Chateaubriand, Hugo, other examples of "swooning and suicide").
Lists of "must-read" books are always subjective, but I'm pleased to see that of the 50 on this list, we have ~10 of them in our household library, specifically:
The Iliad - Homer
The Histories -Herodotus
The Republic- Plato
The Bible
The Prince -Machiavelli
Common Sense -Paine
The Communist Manifesto -Marx
Madame Bovary (en francais, bien sur) -Flaubert
Lady Chatterley's Lover -Lawrence
Nineteen Eighty-Four -Orwell
I'm pretty sure we also have digital copies of
The Qur'an
A Christmas Carol
Uncle Tom's Cabin
And I've read Moby Dick and Harry Potter, though I wonder about the transformative power of the latter. And I will say that of the books on the list, I read exactly two of them while getting a liberal arts degree, one in an American Lit class and one in a French Lit class. The others are either from hubby's classics degree or because one or the other of us felt like those books "should be" on our shelves.
Only five of these books are by women (Pride and Prejudice, Uncle Tom's Cabin, The Second Sex, Silent Spring, Harry Potter), there's a Token Black (Chinua Achebe), and there are a lot of economic and scientific books in here.
Some of the choices seem to be illustrative and don't actually stand the test of time, like the telephone book, or the Ptolemy atlas, but I do like the inclusions that don't come off like reference materials, ones that are actual novels or epistolaries or anthologies.
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion is an interesting choice, in that it inspired Mein Kampf (not on the list), and not one I'd heard of but clearly has an effect on antisemitism. On the other side, he chose Primo Levi's If This is a Man as a Holocaust memoir, instead of Elie Wiesel's Night.
All in all, an interesting list.
Lists of "must-read" books are always subjective, but I'm pleased to see that of the 50 on this list, we have ~10 of them in our household library, specifically:
The Iliad - Homer
The Histories -Herodotus
The Republic- Plato
The Bible
The Prince -Machiavelli
Common Sense -Paine
The Communist Manifesto -Marx
Madame Bovary (en francais, bien sur) -Flaubert
Lady Chatterley's Lover -Lawrence
Nineteen Eighty-Four -Orwell
I'm pretty sure we also have digital copies of
The Qur'an
A Christmas Carol
Uncle Tom's Cabin
And I've read Moby Dick and Harry Potter, though I wonder about the transformative power of the latter. And I will say that of the books on the list, I read exactly two of them while getting a liberal arts degree, one in an American Lit class and one in a French Lit class. The others are either from hubby's classics degree or because one or the other of us felt like those books "should be" on our shelves.
Only five of these books are by women (Pride and Prejudice, Uncle Tom's Cabin, The Second Sex, Silent Spring, Harry Potter), there's a Token Black (Chinua Achebe), and there are a lot of economic and scientific books in here.
Some of the choices seem to be illustrative and don't actually stand the test of time, like the telephone book, or the Ptolemy atlas, but I do like the inclusions that don't come off like reference materials, ones that are actual novels or epistolaries or anthologies.
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion is an interesting choice, in that it inspired Mein Kampf (not on the list), and not one I'd heard of but clearly has an effect on antisemitism. On the other side, he chose Primo Levi's If This is a Man as a Holocaust memoir, instead of Elie Wiesel's Night.
All in all, an interesting list.
May 11, 2020
I was attracted by the word "books" in the title - I was in a bookshop at the airport and I was looking for something interesting to read that wasn't a best seller (nothing agains them, btw). Some years have passed and then I got into the quarantine spirit. It's as if time has slowed, no need to fill the day with things to do outside (necessary or pleasurable), and I started to select activities - and books - that have been put aside for lack of time or inclination.
This is an easy book to read. It's divided in short chapters, each one describing one book, in a personal selection aiming to encompass those that the author sees as the most relevant for the humankind. One may disagree with the selection but I think that it's fair. It really covers a wide range of literary examples of human knowledge that established new parameters in diverse fields. It was nice to see some of the books that were so important in my life and it was good to learn a little bit of many others that I haven't had the opportunity to read. Maybe I won't read those but I'm able to understand its importance.
All in all it's a very useful book.
This is an easy book to read. It's divided in short chapters, each one describing one book, in a personal selection aiming to encompass those that the author sees as the most relevant for the humankind. One may disagree with the selection but I think that it's fair. It really covers a wide range of literary examples of human knowledge that established new parameters in diverse fields. It was nice to see some of the books that were so important in my life and it was good to learn a little bit of many others that I haven't had the opportunity to read. Maybe I won't read those but I'm able to understand its importance.
All in all it's a very useful book.
July 14, 2020
Interesting book, although I find his inclusion of the first telephone directory ludicrous and the contemptible The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion offensive. Yes, it was influential in the worst possible way, but why would anyone want to give that piece of trash a spotlight?
The write-ups for each of the featured books (about 4 pages each) are full of interesting details about the books, authors, and their place in history, but I find the choices a little confusing. For example, for Ptolemy, instead of The Almagest, arguably his most influential work, the author chose to focus on Geographia. Huh?
It was worth perusing from the library, but I have no desire to pick up my own copy, which sort of surprised me.
The write-ups for each of the featured books (about 4 pages each) are full of interesting details about the books, authors, and their place in history, but I find the choices a little confusing. For example, for Ptolemy, instead of The Almagest, arguably his most influential work, the author chose to focus on Geographia. Huh?
It was worth perusing from the library, but I have no desire to pick up my own copy, which sort of surprised me.
August 13, 2025
Yllättävä näkökulma maailmanhistoriaan.
Mukana tuttuja, ilmiselviä kirjoja: raamattu, 1984, Kommunistinen manifesti, Kansojen varallisuus. Ja yllättäviä tai vähän tunnettuja: Ptolemaioksen Geographia, Avicennan Lääketieteen kaanon.
Kirjan herättämiä ajatuksia:
⭐️Kuinka laadukkaasti ihmiset ajattelivat vuosisatoja (tuhansiakin) sitten: Platon, Ptolemaios, Mercator, Harvey, no tietenkin Galilei, Newton jne.
⭐️Einstein halusi kirjoittaa suhteellisuusteorian niin, että se on ylioppilaankin ymmärrettävissä!
⭐️Aristakhos Samoslainen (never höörd) esitti 300 eKr., että taivaiden sijasta liikkui maa.
⭐️Ensimmäisen "maailman"kartaston tekijä Ptolemaios tiesi (150 jKR.), että maailma on pyöreä.
Mukana tuttuja, ilmiselviä kirjoja: raamattu, 1984, Kommunistinen manifesti, Kansojen varallisuus. Ja yllättäviä tai vähän tunnettuja: Ptolemaioksen Geographia, Avicennan Lääketieteen kaanon.
Kirjan herättämiä ajatuksia:
⭐️Kuinka laadukkaasti ihmiset ajattelivat vuosisatoja (tuhansiakin) sitten: Platon, Ptolemaios, Mercator, Harvey, no tietenkin Galilei, Newton jne.
⭐️Einstein halusi kirjoittaa suhteellisuusteorian niin, että se on ylioppilaankin ymmärrettävissä!
⭐️Aristakhos Samoslainen (never höörd) esitti 300 eKr., että taivaiden sijasta liikkui maa.
⭐️Ensimmäisen "maailman"kartaston tekijä Ptolemaios tiesi (150 jKR.), että maailma on pyöreä.
August 18, 2025
On mahtavaa, miten kirjoilla on voima muuttaa maailmaa - niin hyvässä kuin pahassakin. Valitettavasti tämä kirja ei ole yksi maailmaa muuttavista kirjoista... Kirja tuntui auttamattomasti vanhentuneelta (noin 15 vuodessa!). Olisin kaivannut enemmän analyysiä itse kirjoista, ja vähemmän tietoa kirjailijoiden elämästä. En myöskään allekirjoittanut kaikkia kirjailijan ajatuksia, ja välillä jopa säpsähdin, että miten hän nyt näin kirjoittaa.
April 21, 2022
Interesting walk-through time. I don't agree with all his choices (Harry Potter?), but he had good arguments for each choice. I wished for more women and BIPOC authors, but I wasn't making the argument that each book changed the world. I learned about books I never heard fo that really sound like they changed the world, the one on how the heart pumps blood spring to mind.
March 7, 2018
What a great read, several of the books I had not heard of and will be adding to my “Must Read” list. Wonderful way that the book is organized and the information it shares about each book and its place in history and how it literally changed the world. Read it:)
January 1, 2019
I love the fact that this small book not only gives you a bit of info about each 50 books but it gives you the summary from a good perspective I swear it is really rare to find a writer that would mention what good a book Carrie's without being a prejudices
May 17, 2024
Un viaggio diacronico nel pensiero dell'umanità attraverso le parole scritte su carta. Una raccolta argomentata e contestualizzata dei libri che, secondo Taylor, hanno influenzato maggiormente la nostra storia. Una lettura interessante e scorrevole.
May 10, 2025
As the book advances, the title selections grow increasingly lackluster, hamstrung by the author’s puzzling fixation on word counts. Although a handful of entries offer genuine insight, far too many fall flat—undermining the book’s overall impact.
August 5, 2017
An enjoyable read which provided the synopsis of the curated books and the author's input on their significance in how they have influenced the world as we know today.
July 23, 2021
My type of book. I marked it all up!
October 11, 2025
Molto interessante, anche se ha una visione centrata al mondo anglissassone.
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