I’m a sucker for books like The Modern Library: The 200 Best Novels in English Since 1950. Carman Callil and Colm Toibin present a fascinating mix of books (as you can see by their selections below). After the list, Callil and Toibin provide a 1-page description of each book. On top of this, The Modern Library also lists award winners (National Book Award, Man Booker, Pulitzer, etc.) which is handy. The Modern Library was first published in England in 1998. Running Press reprinted it for the U.S. market in 2011 and I just found it by chance on AMAZON and ordered it. Now I have plenty of new novels and new writers to explore! How many of these books have you read? GRADE: A
List of titles in order of publication
1950
A Murder is Announced Agatha Christie
Nothing Henry Green
Power Without Glory Frank Hardy
The Grand Sophy Georgette Heyer
1951
December Bride Sam Hanna Bell
My Cousin Rachel Daphne du Maurier
The West Pier Patrick Hamilton
The Ballad of the Sad Café Carson McCullers
A Dance to theMusic of Time (1951–75) Anthony Powell
The Catcher in the Rye J. D. Salinger
1952
Invisible Man Ralph Ellison
The Old Man and the Sea Ernest Hemingway
The Natural Bernard Malamud
The Financial Expert R. K. Narayan
Wise Blood Flannery O’Connor
East of Eden John Steinbeck
The Sword of Honour Trilogy (1952–61) Evelyn Waugh
1953
Private Life of an Indian Prince Mulk Raj Anand
Go Tell it on the Mountain James Baldwin
The Adventures of Augie March Saul Bellow
The Long Good-Bye Raymond Chandler
The Go-Between L. P. Hartley
The Echoing Grove Rosamond Lehmann
The Palm-Wine Drinkard Amos Tutuola
1954
Lucky Jim Kingsley Amis
Lord of the Flies William Golding
The Tortoise and the Hare Elizabeth Jenkins
The Flint Anchor Sylvia Townsend Warner
1955
The Molloy Trilogy (1955–58) Samuel Beckett
The Recognitions William Gaddis
The Talented Mr Ripley Patricia Highsmith
Lolita Vladimir Nabokov
1956
A Legacy Sybille Bedford
Train to Pakistan Khushwant Singh
1957
Owls Do Cry Janet Frame
On the Road Jack Kerouac
Angel Elizabeth Taylor
The Fountain Overflows Rebecca West
1958
Things Fall Apart Chinua Achebe
Anecdotes of Destiny Isak Dinesen
From the Terrace John O’Hara
Saturday Night and Sunday Morning Alan Sillitoe
1959
Naked Lunch William Burroughs
A Heritage and its History Ivy Compton-Burnett
The Little Disturbances of Man Grace Paley
1960
To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee
The Balkan Trilogy (1960–65) Olivia Manning
The Rabbit Quartet (1960–90) John Updike
Jeeves in the Offing P. G. Wodehouse
(US: How Right You Are, Jeeves)
1961
Catch-22 Joseph Heller
A House for Mr Biswas V. S. Naipaul
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie Muriel Spark
Riders in the Chariot Patrick White
1962
That’s How it Was Maureen Duffy
The Reivers William Faulkner
The Golden Notebook Doris Lessing
The Lonely Girl Edna O’Brien
(renamed Girl with Green Eyes 1964)
Ship of Fools Katherine Anne Porter
1963
The Little Girls Elizabeth Bowen
The Spy Who Came in from the Cold John Le Carré
The Group Mary McCarthy
The Bell Jar Sylvia Plath
1964
Herzog Saul Bellow
Heartland Wilson Harris
Last Exit to Brooklyn Hubert Selby Jr.
1965
Memoirs of a Peon Frank Sargeson
The Interpreters Wole Soyinka
1966
The Magus John Fowles
A Jest of God Margaret Laurence
Wide Sargasso Sea Jean Rhys
The Jewel in the Crown Paul Scott
Cotters’ England Christina Stead
(US: Dark Places of the Heart 1967)
1967
The Confessions of Nat Turner William Styron
A Grain of Wheat Ngugi Wa Thiong’o
1968
In the Heart of the Heart of the Country William H. Gass
The Nice and the Good Iris Murdoch
1969
The Unfortunates B. S. Johnson
Happiness Mary Lavin
The Godfather Mario Puzo
1970
Fifth Business Robertson Davies
Master and Commander Patrick O’Brian
1971
The Day of the Jackal Frederick Forsyth
St Urbain’s Horseman Mordecai Richler
Black List, Section H Francis Stuart
1972
The Optimist’s Daughter Eudora Welty
1973
The Siege of Krishnapur J. G. Farrell
Gravity’s Rainbow Thomas Pynchon
1975
Ragtime E. L. Doctorow
Heat and Dust Ruth Prawer Jhabvala
Changing Places David Lodge
1976
The Lost Salt Gift of Blood Alistair MacLeod
Interview with the Vampire Anne Rice
Saville David Storey
1977
Injury Time Beryl Bainbridge
Falconer John Cheever
A Book of Common Prayer Joan Didion
The Ice Age Margaret Drabble
1978
Tirra Lirra by the River Jessica Anderson
Plumb Maurice Gee
The Human Factor Graham Greene
The Murderer Roy A. K. Heath
The Cement Garden Ian McEwan
1979
The Year of the French Thomas Flanagan
From the Fifteenth District Mavis Gallant
Burger’s Daughter Nadine Gordimer
Sleepless Nights Elizabeth Hardwick
The Executioner’s Song Norman Mailer
A Bend in the River V. S. Naipaul
1980
Earthly Powers Anthony Burgess
The Transit of Venus Shirley Hazzard
Riddley Walker Russell Hoban
Lamb Bernard MacLaverty
So Long, See You Tomorrow William Maxwell
Housekeeping Marilynne Robinson
A Confederacy of Dunces John Kennedy Toole
Puffball Fay Weldon
1981
Lanark Alasdair Gray
Red Dragon Thomas Harris
Midnight’s Children Salman Rushdie
A Flag for Sunrise Robert Stone
1982
On the Black Hill Bruce Chatwin
Schindler’s Ark Thomas Keneally
(US: Schindler’s List)
The Color Purple Alice Walker
A Boy’s Own Story Edmund White
1984
Money Martin Amis
Empire of the Sun J. G. Ballard
Flaubert’s Parrot Julian Barnes
In Custody Anita Desai
The Children’s Bach Helen Garner
Nation of Fools Balraj Khanna
Machine Dreams Jayne Anne Phillips
1985
Family and Friends Anita Brookner
Blood Meridian Cormac McCarthy
Lonesome Dove Larry McMurtry
Black Robe Brian Moore
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit Jeanette Winterson
1986
The Sportswriter Richard Ford
An Artist of the Floating World Kazuo Ishiguro
A Summons to Memphis Peter Taylor
A Dark-Adapted Eye Barbara Vine (Ruth Rendell)
1987
Ellen Foster Kaye Gibbons
Double Whammy Carl Hiaasen
Misery Stephen King
Beloved Toni Morrison
In the Skin of a Lion Michael Ondaatje
The Other Garden Francis Wyndham
1988
Oscar and Lucinda Peter Carey
Where I’m Calling From Raymond Carver
Paris Trout Pete Dexter
The Sugar Mother Elizabeth Jolley
Forty-Seventeen Frank Moorhouse
Ice-Candy-Man Bapsi Sidhwa
Breathing Lessons Anne Tyler
The Bonfire of the Vanities Tom Wolfe
1989
The Book of Evidence John Banville
The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love Oscar Hijuelos
The Joy Luck Club Amy Tan
1990
Possession A. S. Byatt
Age of Iron J. M. Coetzee
A Home at the End of the World Michael Cunningham
The Snapper Roddy Doyle
Get Shorty Elmore Leonard
Amongst Women John McGahern
The Great World David Malouf
Friend of My Youth Alice Munro
1991
The Regeneration Trilogy (1991–95) Pat Barker
Wise Children Angela Carter
A Strange and Sublime Address Amit Chaudhuri
American Psycho Bret Easton Ellis
The Redundancy of Courage Timothy Mo
Mating Norman Rush
Downriver Iain Sinclair
A Thousand Acres Jane Smiley
Reading Turgenev William Trevor
Cloudstreet Tim Winton
1992
Death and Nightingales Eugene McCabe
The Butcher Boy Patrick McCabe
The Secret History Donna Tartt
1993
The Virgin Suicides Jeffrey Eugenides
Birdsong Sebastian Faulks
A River Sutra Gita Mehta
The Shipping News E. Annie Proulx
My Idea of Fun Will Self
A Suitable Boy Vikram Seth
Trainspotting Irvine Welsh
1994
What a Carve Up! Jonathan Coe
(US: The Winshaw Legacy)
Captain Corelli’s Mandolin Louis de Bernières
(US: Corelli’s Mandolin)
The Folding Star Alan Hollinghurst
Original Sin P. D. James
How Late it Was, How Late James Kelman
1995
The Tortilla Curtain T. Coraghessan Boyle
The Blue Flower Penelope Fitzgerald
A Fine Balance Rohinton Mistry
1996
Alias Grace Margaret Atwood
Asylum Patrick McGrath
Last Orders Graham Swift
The Night in Question Tobias Wolff
1997
Quarantine Jim Crace
Underworld Don DeLillo
Cold Mountain Charles Frazier
American Pastoral Philip Roth
1998
The Lady From Guatemala V. S. Pritchett
Some odd selections. One T.C. Boyle-The Tortilla Curtain-not one of his better books. Not much genre other than a few crime novels. Would have liked to see some Ursula K. Leguin .
Steve, I agree with you on the odd Boyle choice. Callil and Toibin, in their Introduction, discuss their policy not to include Science Fiction and Fantasy.
Well, they’re full of shit, then.
Not least because INTERVIEW WITH A VAMPIRE is fantasy (and terrible), BELOVED is fantasy, LORD OF THE FLIES is sf, GRAVITY’S RAINBOW and THE NAKED LUNCH are at least at the borders of sf and fantasy, as are a slew of others here. And no amount of ignorant special pleading will make them not so.
14, but I’ve been wasting my time reading trash.
Bob, I’ve read 105. But there are some titles on this list I have no interest in reading.
Read more than I thought-46.
Steve, 46 is a solid number.
46–but I wish the list had been updated to take it through 1999/2000. I agree with Steve–they do seem to have made some odd choices and with a few of them, I felt it was more of a getting-on- the-bandwagon thing: Let’s see, we’ve got to include Ian McEwan, what did he publish in 1979?
Deb, 46 seems to be a popular number! Yes, I had that same sense that certain choices were “forced.”
The Godfather? Surely not.
47 or so, but a couple were trilogies and the Powell Dance to the Music of Time is 12 books (read them all).
Jeff, I’m with you on THE GODFATHER. The trilogies create a counting problem.
Interesting to see a lot of crime fiction (“a lot” relative to what one usually finds in lists of this sort, usually heavy on capital-L Literature), and almost no SF/fantasy. Also, is there a disclaimer somewhere that this “Modern Library” is not to be confused with the Modern Library imprint of Random House that has been around since 1917? I’m assuming this ML has nothing to do with that ML, and why isn’t there a lawsuit?
Art, I suppose Callil and Toibin accept crime fiction as “literature.” There could well be a lawsuit in the works.
I’d think the Random House Modern Library would be hopping mad about this book, especially since it invites confusion with their own 100 Best Novels in English list that their editorial board devised & published in 1998. The latter is a much more usual-suspects Literary list, though Maltese Falcon & Postman Rings Twice are on it. They also produced a Reader’s Poll 100 Best, the legitimacy of which is suspect, given that 3 L. Ron Hubbard novels are on it (Hi, Bob!). Wonder how that happened?
Art, THE MODERN LIBRARY was first published in England over 15 years ago. Maybe this is just Old News to the U.S. Modern Library.
83 but a very eccentric list. And too slanted to British novels.
Patti, 83 is an impressive number! Yes, there’s definitely a British novel bias.
Yet another list I’m not on.
Bill, but you should be on this list!
Given that I primarily read genre fiction, my 35 isn’t a bad number, most of them pre-1990s. I agree it’s a bit of an odd list, with multiple volume sets and specific author picks, such as the Steinbeck. Which reminds me, here’s another list to check, and I’ll bet we all have read a higher percentage on it!
http://readingcalifornia.typepad.com/reading_california_fictio/2014/02/californias-famous-fifty-the-complete-list.html The discussion of the list on the bracketed posts is also of interest, having to do with popularity, sales and books in library collections. Maybe another post for you, George. (or me…)
Nice list, Rick! I’ve read 43 of the books listed.
Only 19 so far. Haven’t read so very much of Steinbeck yet.
Todd, Callil and Toibin have a very loose definition of SF and Fantasy as you point out. I also detected some “homer” picks.
(And that was 19 of the Cali list Richard provides. More, but I’ve forgotten how many, of the snobs’ book.)