Looking for your new favourite book? Want to branch out into new genres and don't know where to start? Here are our choices for 100 classic books. If you would like to read these classics with greater confidence, an online English lesson can help strengthen your vocabulary and comprehension.
Key Takeaways
- Classic books cover far more than one genre: romance, dystopian fiction, historical fiction and family sagas all have a place in the canon.⁷
- Classics can appeal across generations: the British Library describes its classics collection as stories that continue to endure, inspire and delight readers.²
- Choose according to your tastes: genre, mood, length and difficulty are often more useful starting points than reputation alone.
What Makes a Book a Classic?
A classic is a book which has never exhausted all it has to say to its readers.⁹
Italo Calvino
Firstly, there isn't a hard age limit for a book to become a classic. However, the best classic literature earns that status partly through lasting influence and cultural importance, and both of these usually take time. That's why any list of classic books will skew towards older books even though you can enjoy the benefits of reading from almost any book.
Classic books are defined more by lasting literary, cultural or historical importance than by age alone. They continue to attract readers, influence writers and remain relevant long after publication.⁵
Are Modern Books Considered Classics?
Modern books can be considered classics, but when longevity is a factor, they're less likely to make the list. Of course, when more modern works have a huge cultural impact, including being taught in classrooms, they can be considered. Just don't expect many very recent books on our list!
years of literature, from ancient works to modern classics.⁸
How We Chose These Classic Books
- Lasting influence: books that shaped literature or inspired later writers
- Cultural importance: works that influenced society, ideas or popular culture
- Continued readership: classics that are still widely read and discussed
- Critical recognition: books with an established literary reputation
- Range: different genres, periods, countries and perspectives
- Modern relevance: stories and themes that still resonate with readers today
Classic Books to Read First
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.¹
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
Not every classic book is as accessible. If you want to read the classics, you can't just start with any. We recommend starting with shorter, more accessible novels, perhaps in a genre you already enjoy. Of course, if you want to read longer books, it helps to improve your reading speed.
Good starting points include Pride and Prejudice, 1984, Jane Eyre, The Great Gatsby and The Hobbit, which offer accessible introductions to romance, dystopia, Gothic fiction, literary fiction and fantasy.
Classic Romance and Social Fiction
| Book | Author | First published | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pride and Prejudice | Jane Austen | 1813 | Romance and social satire |
| Jane Eyre | Charlotte Brontë | 1847 | Gothic romance |
| Wuthering Heights | Emily Brontë | 1847 | Dark romance |
| Middlemarch | George Eliot | 1871–72 | Society and relationships |
| Anna Karenina | Leo Tolstoy | 1878 | Love and family |
| North and South | Elizabeth Gaskell | 1855 | Romance and class |
Gothic, Mystery and Dark Classics
| Book | Author | First published | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Frankenstein | Mary Shelley | 1818 | Gothic and science fiction |
| Dracula | Bram Stoker | 1897 | Gothic horror |
| Rebecca | Daphne du Maurier | 1938 | Psychological suspense |
| The Picture of Dorian Gray | Oscar Wilde | 1890 | Gothic decadence |
| And Then There Were None | Agatha Christie | 1939 | Murder mystery |
| The Hound of the Baskervilles | Arthur Conan Doyle | 1902 | Detective fiction |
The 100 Best Classic Books, Grouped by What You Want to Read
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.³
Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
Any ranking is subjective, so we've avoided ranking our top 100. Instead, we've tried to group them by area of interest. That way, you can find potential new reading opportunities in genres and styles, from poetry to modern literature, plus a few of our favourite genres you like or that you'd like to explore.
Adventure and Fantasy Classics
| Book | Author | First published | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Odyssey | Homer | c. 8th century BCE | Epic adventure |
| The Hobbit | J. R. R. Tolkien | 1937 | Accessible fantasy |
| The Lord of the Rings | J. R. R. Tolkien | 1954–55 | Epic fantasy |
| Treasure Island | Robert Louis Stevenson | 1883 | Pirate adventure |
| The Count of Monte Cristo | Alexandre Dumas | 1844–46 | Revenge and adventure |
| A Wizard of Earthsea | Ursula K. Le Guin | 1968 | Fantasy and coming of age |
Political and Dystopian Classics
| Book | Author | First published | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1984 | George Orwell | 1949 | Surveillance and authoritarianism |
| Animal Farm | George Orwell | 1945 | Political allegory |
| Brave New World | Aldous Huxley | 1932 | Dystopian society |
| Fahrenheit 451 | Ray Bradbury | 1953 | Censorship |
| The Handmaid’s Tale | Margaret Atwood | 1985 | Gender and power |
| The Grapes of Wrath | John Steinbeck | 1939 | Poverty and inequality |
Timeless Love Stories and Social Novels
- Pride and Prejudice — Jane Austen (1813)
- Jane Eyre — Charlotte Brontë (1847)
- Wuthering Heights — Emily Brontë (1847)
- Anna Karenina — Leo Tolstoy (1878)
- Middlemarch — George Eliot (1871–72)
- The Age of Innocence — Edith Wharton (1920)
- The House of Mirth — Edith Wharton (1905)
- A Room with a View — E. M. Forster (1908)
- The Awakening — Kate Chopin (1899)
- Love in the Time of Cholera — Gabriel García Márquez (1985)
- North and South — Elizabeth Gaskell (1855)
- Little Women — Louisa May Alcott (1868)
Classic Books About Society, Politics and Power
- 1984 — George Orwell (1949)
- Animal Farm — George Orwell (1945)
- Brave New World — Aldous Huxley (1932)
- Fahrenheit 451 — Ray Bradbury (1953)
- The Handmaid's Tale — Margaret Atwood (1985)
- The Grapes of Wrath — John Steinbeck (1939)
- To Kill a Mockingbird — Harper Lee (1960)
- Invisible Man — Ralph Ellison (1952)
- Beloved — Toni Morrison (1987)
- The Trial — Franz Kafka (1925)
- Lord of the Flies — William Golding (1954)
Mystery, Gothic and Dark Classic Fiction
- Dracula — Bram Stoker (1897)
- Frankenstein — Mary Shelley (1818)
- Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde — Robert Louis Stevenson (1886)
- The Picture of Dorian Gray — Oscar Wilde (1890)
- Rebecca — Daphne du Maurier (1938)
- The Woman in White — Wilkie Collins (1860)
- And Then There Were None — Agatha Christie (1939)
- The Hound of the Baskervilles — Arthur Conan Doyle (1902)
- The Turn of the Screw — Henry James (1898)
- We Have Always Lived in the Castle — Shirley Jackson (1962)
- The Haunting of Hill House — Shirley Jackson (1959)
Adventure, Fantasy and Epic Classics
- The Odyssey — Homer (c. 8th century BCE)
- The Hobbit — J. R. R. Tolkien (1937)
- The Lord of the Rings — J. R. R. Tolkien (1954–55)
- Treasure Island — Robert Louis Stevenson (1883)
- The Count of Monte Cristo — Alexandre Dumas (1844–46)
- The Three Musketeers — Alexandre Dumas (1844)
- Adventures of Huckleberry Finn — Mark Twain (1884)
- Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas — Jules Verne (1870)
- The Call of the Wild — Jack London (1903)
- A Wizard of Earthsea — Ursula K. Le Guin (1968)
- Alice's Adventures in Wonderland — Lewis Carroll (1865)
Short Classic Books for Busy Readers
- Of Mice and Men — John Steinbeck (1937)
- The Great Gatsby — F. Scott Fitzgerald (1925)
- The Old Man and the Sea — Ernest Hemingway (1952)
- The Metamorphosis — Franz Kafka (1915)
- The Stranger — Albert Camus (1942)
- A Christmas Carol — Charles Dickens (1843)
- The Death of Ivan Ilyich — Leo Tolstoy (1886)
- The Importance of Being Earnest — Oscar Wilde (1895)
- The Yellow Wallpaper — Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1892)
- The Little Prince — Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1943)
- The Time Machine — H. G. Wells (1895)
Literary Classics for Readers Who Want a Challenge
- Moby-Dick — Herman Melville (1851)
- Ulysses — James Joyce (1922)
- War and Peace — Leo Tolstoy (1869)
- Crime and Punishment — Fyodor Dostoevsky (1866)
- The Brothers Karamazov — Fyodor Dostoevsky (1880)
- One Hundred Years of Solitude — Gabriel García Márquez (1967)
- The Sound and the Fury — William Faulkner (1929)
- The Divine Comedy — Dante Alighieri (c. 1321)
- Don Quixote — Miguel de Cervantes (1605/1615)
- In Search of Lost Time — Marcel Proust (1913–27)
- The Magic Mountain — Thomas Mann (1924)
Classic Books by Women Writers
- The Color Purple — Alice Walker (1982)
- Their Eyes Were Watching God — Zora Neale Hurston (1937)
- The Bell Jar — Sylvia Plath (1963)
- The Golden Notebook — Doris Lessing (1962)
- The God of Small Things — Arundhati Roy (1997)
- Wide Sargasso Sea — Jean Rhys (1966)
- The Left Hand of Darkness — Ursula K. Le Guin (1969)
- Kindred — Octavia E. Butler (1979)
- The Tenant of Wildfell Hall — Anne Brontë (1848)
- Orlando — Virginia Woolf (1928)
- The Bone People — Keri Hulme (1984)
Essential Classic Books From Around the World
- Things Fall Apart — Chinua Achebe (1958)
- The Tale of Genji — Murasaki Shikibu (c. 1010)
- The Master and Margarita — Mikhail Bulgakov (1966–67)
- The House of the Spirits — Isabel Allende (1982)
- Season of Migration to the North — Tayeb Salih (1966)
- The Blind Owl — Sadegh Hedayat (1937)
- The Cairo Trilogy — Naguib Mahfouz (1956–57)
- The Book of Disquiet — Fernando Pessoa (1982)
- Snow Country — Yasunari Kawabata (1935–37)
- Pedro Páramo — Juan Rulfo (1955)
- The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas — Machado de Assis (1881)
Classic Plays, Poetry and Foundational Texts
- Hamlet — William Shakespeare (c. 1600)
- Romeo and Juliet — William Shakespeare (c. 1595)
- Antigone — Sophocles (c. 441 BCE)
- The Aeneid — Virgil (29–19 BCE)
- Paradise Lost — John Milton (1667)
- Leaves of Grass — Walt Whitman (1855)
- The Waste Land — T. S. Eliot (1922)
- The Iliad — Homer (c. 8th century BCE)
- The Epic of Gilgamesh — anonymous (ancient Mesopotamia)
- The Canterbury Tales — Geoffrey Chaucer (c. 1387–1400)
- The Mahabharata — traditionally attributed to Vyasa (compiled over several centuries)
Famous Books by Era
Call me Ishmael.⁴
Herman Melville, Moby-Dick
Literary classics change over time, but the benefits of reading don't. It's recommended that you read every book understanding its original context and how it reads today. That way you can appreciate both how the book came to be in its time, how its enduring appeal makes it more interesting, and even understand the mentality of certain people at certain times.
Keri Hulme's The Bone People was first published by Spiral in 1984.⁶ The novel won the Booker Prize in 1985, making Hulme the first New Zealand writer to receive the award.¹⁰
Literary and World Classics
| Book | Author | First published | Literary tradition |
|---|---|---|---|
| Things Fall Apart | Chinua Achebe | 1958 | Nigeria |
| The Tale of Genji | Murasaki Shikibu | c. 1010 | Japan |
| The Master and Margarita | Mikhail Bulgakov | 1966–67 | Russia |
| The Bone People | Keri Hulme | 1984 | New Zealand |
| One Hundred Years of Solitude | Gabriel García Márquez | 1967 | Colombia |
| The Cairo Trilogy | Naguib Mahfouz | 1956–57 | Egypt |
Ancient and Medieval Classics
- The Epic of Gilgamesh — ancient Mesopotamia
- The Iliad — Homer
- The Odyssey — Homer
- Antigone — Sophocles
- The Aeneid — Virgil
- The Tale of Genji — Murasaki Shikibu
- The Divine Comedy — Dante Alighieri
- The Canterbury Tales — Geoffrey Chaucer
Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Classics
- Pride and Prejudice — Jane Austen
- Jane Eyre — Charlotte Brontë
- Wuthering Heights — Emily Brontë
- Frankenstein — Mary Shelley
- Moby-Dick — Herman Melville
- Middlemarch — George Eliot
- Anna Karenina — Leo Tolstoy
- Crime and Punishment — Fyodor Dostoevsky
Early Twentieth-Century Classics
- The Great Gatsby — F. Scott Fitzgerald
- The Trial — Franz Kafka
- Ulysses — James Joyce
- The Sound and the Fury — William Faulkner
- Brave New World — Aldous Huxley
- Rebecca — Daphne du Maurier
- Of Mice and Men — John Steinbeck
- And Then There Were None — Agatha Christie
Post-war and Late Twentieth-Century Modern Classics
- 1984 — George Orwell
- To Kill a Mockingbird — Harper Lee
- Things Fall Apart — Chinua Achebe
- One Hundred Years of Solitude — Gabriel García Márquez
- The Left Hand of Darkness — Ursula K. Le Guin
- Kindred — Octavia E. Butler
- The Bone People — Keri Hulme
- Beloved — Toni Morrison
How to Choose the Right Classic Book for You
You can't choose a book on reputation alone. Genre, mood, length, or difficulty are good criteria for picking a book, though you should make different considerations when introducing children to reading. However, you can also ask for recommendations. Look for a classic you want to read rather than one you feel obliged to finish.
Which is your favourite classic?
Choose a Classic by Mood
- Romance:Pride and Prejudice
- Gothic:Rebecca
- Crime:And Then There Were None
- Dystopia:1984
- Fantasy:The Hobbit
- Adventure:The Count of Monte Cristo
- Short read:Of Mice and Men
- Challenge:Crime and Punishment
Which Translation or Edition Should You Choose?
- Translated classics: compare translators before choosing an edition.
- Older texts: look for helpful notes and introductions.
- Long novels: check whether the edition is abridged or complete.
- Page counts: expect them to vary between editions.
- First-time readers: choose a clear modern translation where available.
- Collectors: prioritise binding, annotations and publication details.
References
- Austen, Jane. Pride and Prejudice. Project Gutenberg. https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42671/pg42671-images.html. Accessed 25 Aug. 2026.
- British Library. "Classic Books & Novels | Best Books of All Time." British Library. https://shop.bl.uk/collections/classics. Accessed 25 Aug. 2026.
- Dickens, Charles. A Tale of Two Cities. Project Gutenberg. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/98/98-h/98-h.htm. Accessed 25 Aug. 2026.
- Melville, Herman. Moby-Dick; Or, The Whale. Project Gutenberg. https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/2489/pg2489-images.html. Accessed 25 Aug. 2026.
- Merriam-Webster. "Classic." Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/classic. Accessed 25 Aug. 2026.
- New Zealand History. "Spiral." Manatū Taonga, Ministry for Culture and Heritage. https://nzhistory.govt.nz/women-together/spiral. Accessed 25 Aug. 2026.
- Penguin Books. "100 Must-Read Classics, as Chosen by Our Readers." Penguin Books, 13 Apr. 2026. https://www.penguin.co.uk/discover/articles/100-must-read-classic-books. Accessed 25 Aug. 2026.
- Penguin Books. "Penguin Classics." Penguin Books. https://www.penguin.co.uk/about/publishing-houses/penguin-press/penguin-classics. Accessed 25 Aug. 2026.
- Penguin Books. Penguin Modern Classics: The Complete List. Penguin Books, 15 Feb. 2011. https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/181852/penguin-modern-classics-the-complete-list/9780141970318. Accessed 25 Aug. 2026.
- The Booker Prizes. "The Booker Prize 1985." The Booker Prizes. https://thebookerprizes.com/the-booker-library/prize-years/1985. Accessed 25 Aug. 2026.
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