The Bloom Boxall Great Fiction List--Read 'Em Or Else Vol. I: Pre-1800

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I cross-referenced Harold Bloom’s Western Canon with the Peter Boxall "1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die" (2006 and 2008 versions, inclusive) to come up with this Must-Read list to end all Must-Read lists. It will be split into three volumes by century. PLEASE DON’T ADD OR DELETE ANYTHING. Create your own, or adopt mine and leave me a comment if I have omitted something. Please remember that Bloom is hopelessly stuffy (H. G. Wells is "serious" literature and Jules Verne isn’t; Waugh’s political satire is worthwhile and "Brideshead Revisited" is fluff) and that his "canon" doesn’t include anything from the past 20 years or so. Boxall’s lists are almost entirely comprised of novels.

  1. 1.
    Aesop's Fables: A Classic Illustrated Edition (Classics Illustrated)
    by R. and Higton, B. Ash

    Drag me to re-order


  2. 2.
    ?
    The Thousand and One Nights (complete collection)
    by Anonymous

    Drag me to re-order


  3. 3.
    ?
    The Metamorphoses
    by Ovid

    Drag me to re-order


  4. 5.
    ?
    The Luciads
    by Luis de Camoëns

    Drag me to re-order


  5. 7.

  6. 9.
    Don Quixote
    by Miguel de Cervantes

    Drag me to re-order


  7. 10.
    ?
    The Pilgrim’s Progress
    by John Bunyan

    Drag me to re-order


  8. 11.
    ?
    The Princess of Cleves
    by Madame de La Fayette

    Drag me to re-order


  9. 12.
    A Tale of A Tub (Great Ideas S.)
    by Jonathan Swift

    Drag me to re-order


  10. 13.

  11. 14.
    ?
    Robinson Crusoe
    by Daniel Defoe

    Drag me to re-order


  12. 15.
    Moll Flanders (Norton Critical Editions)
    by Daniel Defoe

    Drag me to re-order


  13. 16.
    ?
    Tom Jones
    by Henry Fielding

    Drag me to re-order


  14. 19.
    ?
    Pamela
    by Samuel Richardson

    Drag me to re-order


  15. 21.
    Candide
    by Voltaire

    Drag me to re-order


  16. 23.
    Emile, or On Education
    by John, Jacques Rousseau

    Drag me to re-order


  17. 24.
    ?
    The Vicar of Wakefield
    by Oliver Goldsmith

    Drag me to re-order


  18. 25.
    ?

  19. 26.
    ?
    A Sentimental Journey Through France and Germany
    by Laurence Sterne

    Drag me to re-order


  20. 27.
    ?
    The Sorrows of Young Werther
    by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

    Drag me to re-order


  21. 28.
    Evalina
    by Fanny Burney

    Drag me to re-order


  22. 29.
    Dangerous Liasons (Classic Fiction)
    by Choderlos de Laclos

    Drag me to re-order


  23. 30.
    ?
    Confessions
    by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

    Drag me to re-order


  24. 31.
    ?
    Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship
    by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

    Drag me to re-order


  25. 32.
    Elective Affinities (Oxford World's Classics)
    by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

    Drag me to re-order


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Created by jillelvish on Oct 08, 2008.
 

Comments

Untitled — 1 year ago

Thanks very much for this list!