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I am on a mission to read and reread classic literature. I searched far and wide for a decent book list but all seem incomplete to me. Please add your favorite classic books to the list.
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| 1 |
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Pride and Prejudice
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4.29 avg rating — 4,711,302 ratings
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| 2 |
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Jane Eyre
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4.16 avg rating — 2,287,942 ratings
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| 3 |
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1984
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4.20 avg rating — 5,331,783 ratings
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| 4 |
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The Count of Monte Cristo
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4.32 avg rating — 1,006,226 ratings
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| 5 |
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Little Women (Little Women, #1)
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4.17 avg rating — 2,420,915 ratings
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| 6 |
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Wuthering Heights
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3.90 avg rating — 1,993,284 ratings
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| 7 |
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Frankenstein
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3.89 avg rating — 1,809,207 ratings
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| 8 |
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The Great Gatsby
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3.93 avg rating — 5,810,816 ratings
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| 9 |
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To Kill a Mockingbird
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4.26 avg rating — 6,772,529 ratings
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| 10 |
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Sense and Sensibility
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4.09 avg rating — 1,280,436 ratings
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| 11 |
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The Odyssey
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3.83 avg rating — 1,172,295 ratings
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| 12 |
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A Tale of Two Cities
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3.88 avg rating — 1,003,720 ratings
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| 13 |
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Great Expectations
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3.80 avg rating — 864,964 ratings
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| 14 |
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Brave New World
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3.99 avg rating — 2,044,728 ratings
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| 15 |
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Animal Farm
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4.01 avg rating — 4,442,007 ratings
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| 16 |
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The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
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3.83 avg rating — 1,328,986 ratings
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| 17 |
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Dracula
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4.02 avg rating — 1,440,383 ratings
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| 18 |
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Fahrenheit 451
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3.97 avg rating — 2,770,378 ratings
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| 19 |
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Hamlet
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4.03 avg rating — 1,033,063 ratings
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| 20 |
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Emma
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4.05 avg rating — 966,444 ratings
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| 21 |
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The Canterbury Tales
by
3.52 avg rating — 236,092 ratings
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| 22 |
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Anna Karenina
by
4.10 avg rating — 918,003 ratings
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| 23 |
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The Catcher in the Rye
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3.80 avg rating — 3,842,554 ratings
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| 24 |
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Romeo and Juliet
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3.74 avg rating — 2,791,909 ratings
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| 25 |
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Persuasion
by
4.15 avg rating — 763,883 ratings
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| 26 |
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The Hobbit, or There and Back Again
by
4.30 avg rating — 4,395,821 ratings
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| 27 |
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Rebecca
by
4.25 avg rating — 712,247 ratings
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| 28 |
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Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland / Through the Looking-Glass
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4.06 avg rating — 603,095 ratings
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| 29 |
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The Scarlet Letter
by
3.44 avg rating — 909,113 ratings
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| 30 |
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Gone with the Wind
by
4.31 avg rating — 1,250,517 ratings
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| 31 |
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Les Misérables
by
4.21 avg rating — 836,826 ratings
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| 32 |
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A Midsummer Night’s Dream
by
3.94 avg rating — 573,018 ratings
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| 33 |
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The Picture of Dorian Gray
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4.13 avg rating — 1,826,792 ratings
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| 34 |
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War and Peace
by
4.17 avg rating — 360,946 ratings
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| 35 |
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The Iliad
by
3.93 avg rating — 502,029 ratings
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| 36 |
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Crime and Punishment
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4.28 avg rating — 1,049,621 ratings
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| 37 |
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Beowulf
by
3.50 avg rating — 344,337 ratings
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| 38 |
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The Complete Tales and Poems
by
4.40 avg rating — 293,541 ratings
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| 39 |
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The Three Musketeers
by
4.10 avg rating — 347,465 ratings
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| 40 |
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Macbeth
by
3.89 avg rating — 1,004,313 ratings
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| 41 |
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Oliver Twist
by
3.88 avg rating — 423,391 ratings
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| 42 |
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Moby-Dick or, The Whale
by
3.56 avg rating — 608,772 ratings
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| 43 |
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Mansfield Park
by
3.86 avg rating — 375,758 ratings
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| 44 |
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The Grapes of Wrath
by
4.02 avg rating — 982,004 ratings
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| 45 |
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Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (Captain Nemo, #2)
by
3.89 avg rating — 273,528 ratings
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| 46 |
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The Republic
by
3.97 avg rating — 222,911 ratings
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| 47 |
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Catch-22
by
3.99 avg rating — 879,752 ratings
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| 48 |
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Madame Bovary
by
3.71 avg rating — 369,208 ratings
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| 49 |
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The Brothers Karamazov
by
4.39 avg rating — 377,787 ratings
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| 50 |
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The Lord of the Rings
by
4.54 avg rating — 723,152 ratings
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| 51 |
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King Lear
by
3.91 avg rating — 234,816 ratings
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| 52 |
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David Copperfield
by
4.04 avg rating — 255,833 ratings
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| 53 |
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Northanger Abbey
by
3.85 avg rating — 446,082 ratings
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| 54 |
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Don Quixote
by
3.91 avg rating — 301,069 ratings
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| 55 |
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The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (Chronicles of Narnia, #1)
by
4.24 avg rating — 3,100,375 ratings
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| 56 |
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The Time Machine
by
3.89 avg rating — 558,453 ratings
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| 57 |
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Lord of the Flies
by
3.70 avg rating — 3,153,427 ratings
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| 58 |
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Journey to the Center of the Earth
by
3.85 avg rating — 221,626 ratings
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| 59 |
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Anne of Green Gables (Anne of Green Gables, #1)
by
4.32 avg rating — 1,095,200 ratings
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| 60 |
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Of Mice and Men
by
3.89 avg rating — 2,787,506 ratings
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| 61 |
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The Moonstone
by
3.91 avg rating — 98,084 ratings
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| 62 |
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Tess of the D’Urbervilles
by
3.84 avg rating — 300,131 ratings
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| 63 |
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Gulliver’s Travels
by
3.59 avg rating — 296,247 ratings
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| 64 |
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The Man Without Qualities
by
4.19 avg rating — 7,285 ratings
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| 65 |
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The Crucible
by
3.61 avg rating — 457,397 ratings
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| 66 |
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Candide
by
3.76 avg rating — 297,816 ratings
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| 67 |
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The Metamorphosis
by
3.90 avg rating — 1,377,705 ratings
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| 68 |
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The Phantom of the Opera
by
3.96 avg rating — 271,870 ratings
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| 69 |
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Vanity Fair
by
3.81 avg rating — 132,555 ratings
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| 70 |
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The Mayor of Casterbridge
by
3.86 avg rating — 65,565 ratings
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| 71 |
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Ivanhoe
by
3.76 avg rating — 98,516 ratings
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| 72 |
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J.R.R. Tolkien 4-Book Boxed Set: The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings
by
4.61 avg rating — 142,729 ratings
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| 73 |
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Treasure Island
by
3.85 avg rating — 534,220 ratings
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| 74 |
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The War of the Worlds
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3.83 avg rating — 345,275 ratings
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| 75 |
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Jude the Obscure
by
3.83 avg rating — 75,352 ratings
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| 76 |
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East of Eden
by
4.43 avg rating — 619,004 ratings
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| 77 |
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The Age of Innocence
by
3.97 avg rating — 192,914 ratings
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| 78 |
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Robinson Crusoe
by
3.68 avg rating — 328,130 ratings
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| 79 |
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Bleak House
by
4.02 avg rating — 113,165 ratings
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| 80 |
|
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Oz, #1)
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really liked it 4.00 avg rating — 504,386 ratings
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| 80 |
|
The Secret Garden
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4.17 avg rating — 1,278,221 ratings
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| 82 |
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Paradise Lost
by
3.85 avg rating — 179,880 ratings
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| 83 |
|
The Divine Comedy: Inferno - Purgatorio - Paradiso
by
4.08 avg rating — 169,581 ratings
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| 84 |
|
Aesop’s Fables
by
4.05 avg rating — 129,097 ratings
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| 85 |
|
Cry, the Beloved Country
by
3.93 avg rating — 79,064 ratings
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| 86 |
|
The Tell-Tale Heart and Other Writings
by
4.19 avg rating — 244,092 ratings
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| 87 |
|
The Histories
by
4.01 avg rating — 55,076 ratings
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| 87 |
|
The Magician’s Nephew (Chronicles of Narnia, #6)
by
4.05 avg rating — 595,260 ratings
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| 89 |
|
Their Eyes Were Watching God
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3.99 avg rating — 381,771 ratings
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| 90 |
|
The House of Mirth
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3.97 avg rating — 104,723 ratings
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| 91 |
|
The Pilgrim's Progress
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4.07 avg rating — 156,395 ratings
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| 92 |
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The Woman in White
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4.01 avg rating — 164,270 ratings
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| 93 |
|
Alice in Wonderland
by
Jane Carruth (Adapted By)
4.03 avg rating — 396,346 ratings
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| 94 |
|
The Aeneid
by
3.87 avg rating — 141,507 ratings
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| 95 |
|
Lolita
by
3.87 avg rating — 931,522 ratings
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| 96 |
|
The Little Prince
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4.33 avg rating — 2,419,304 ratings
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| 97 |
|
A Christmas Carol
by
4.09 avg rating — 904,397 ratings
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| 98 |
|
The Giver (The Giver, #1)
by
Lois Lowry (Goodreads Author)
4.12 avg rating — 2,765,144 ratings
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| 99 |
|
Julius Caesar
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3.71 avg rating — 217,139 ratings
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| 100 |
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Heart of Darkness
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3.43 avg rating — 551,724 ratings
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634 books ·
523 voters ·
list created June 21st, 2008
by Crystal.
Tags:
classic, literature
Comments Showing 1-7 of 7 (7 new)
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message 1:
by
Tamora
(new)
Apr 04, 2009 11:38AM
I'm just clicking on what I've read, not on what I liked. When you're dealing with books like these, that generally drop into everyone's life before they're 20, what you like and what you don't like is highly individual. I don't think you can really go by the opinion of the next person, because you're all forming your opinions. I liked TARZAN, but had no interest in CHARLOTTE'S WEB. My classmates had spasms over CRIME AND PUNISHMENT, so much so that I never told them that I kinda liked it. They were okay with THE SCARLET LETTER, which made me crazy. You really have to try the books that our parents, teachers, and peers think are probably classic, and decide for yourself if they're good reads as far as you're concerned!
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I would just like to say that I believe 'Les Miserables' by Victor Hugo is the best book on this list. And nooooo, I'm not basing it on the hit musical (even though I love that as well), because it did get a lot wrong. I'm currently reading A Tale of 2 Cities, nad let me say I've made a lot of connections to Les Miserables. It's just an amzing and epic Book!
I agree with Tamora, There are several books i've been told are must reads by people who don't read much themselves. I have been disappointed in many of them most books are classics because they've been around forever and a day. Much of the language is outdated and stale. occasionally you do stumble upon a book with a plot that holds up but it is a rare find. That being said, I loved Scarlett Letter and The hunchback of Notra Dame but found Pride and Prejudice tedious at best shallow and mindless at worst
i just discovered my interest in reading so i've read only a few. i just finished che's book on social revolution. so far from what i've read dracula is the best they describe the events as if one was there. my second best is lady chaterley's lover
This is a great list! I have this sort of mission too, although I gotta find a good library to hold all of these books. Too bad I don't have it in the area, or money to but some..
@CrystalI've tried adding other books than then ones originally written in English, apart from voting for the ones already on the list I mean, as there are so many great classics worth reading. All of which are available in English translations, by the way. Books I've added are, for instance, Alle fabels, Lustgebed, Avondgezichten, Het hoofdkussenboek, Het boek van Dede Korkoet, Nibelungenlied, De ring van de duif, Het boek der koningen, De rozentuin and Rubaiyat, to name just a few.
By the way, 'Classics' = 'Modern Classics' too? As there are plenty of those on your list.
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