Monday, December 18, 2006

100 Books To Read 2006 Version 4.0




  1. The Names of Things:
    Life, Language, and Beginnings in the Egyptian Desert
    Susan Brind Morrow
    [02/12/2006 ~ 16/12/2006]

  2. In Search of Lost Time Marcel Proust
    Swann's Way
    translated by Lydia Davis
    [11/07/2006 ~ 09/08/2006]
    In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower
    translated by James Grieve
    [09/08/2006 ~ 16/09/2006]
    The Guermantes Way
    translated by Mark Treharne
    [16/09/2006 ~ 09/12/2006]
    Sodom and Gomorrah

    The Prisoners & The Fugitive

    Finding Time Again

  3. No God But God:
    The Origins, Evolution, and Future of Islam
    Reza Aslan
    [11/11/2006 ~ 04/12/2006]

  4. A Moveable Feast Ernest Hemingway
    [08/11/2006 ~ 16/11/2006]

  5. Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere Jan Morris
    [03/10/2006 ~ 28/10/2006]

  6. Master and Margarita Mikhail Bulgakov
    translated by Richard Pevear & Larissa Volokhonsky
    [12/09/2006 ~ 03/10/2006]

  7. Fast Food Nation Eric Schlosser
    [17/08/2006 ~ 12/09/2006]

  8. The Moonstone Wilkie Collins
    [27/07/2006 ~ 23/08/2007]

  9. The Snow Leopard Peter Matthiessen
    [01/06/2006 ~ 10/07/2006]

  10. Invisible Cities Italo Calvino
    [27/06/2006 ~ 09/07/2006]

  11. The Road to Oxiana Robert Byron
    [07/06/2006 ~ 25/06/2006]

  12. The Pure and the Impure Colette
    [12/06/2006 ~ 24/06/2006]

  13. His Dark Materials Philip Pullman
    Book I: The Golden Compass
    [26/05/2006 ~ 29/05/2006]
    Book II: The Subtle Knife
    [29/05/2006 ~ 31/05/2006]
    Book III: The Amber Spyglass
    [31/05/2006 ~ 12/06/2006]

  14. Love in the Time of Cholera Gabriel Garcia Marquez
    [26/05/2006 ~ 09/06/2006]

  15. Praise of Folly Desiderius Erasmus
    [29/05/2006 ~ 05/06/2006]

  16. The Year of Magical Thinking Joan Didion
    [11/05/2006 ~ 15/05/2006]

  17. Madame Bovary Gustave Flaubert
    [14/02/2006 ~ 13/05/2006]

  18. Beyond Belief Elaine Pagels
    [09/05/2006 ~ 12/05/2006]

  19. Istanbul : Memories and the City Orhan Pamuk
    translated by Maureen Freely
    [05/05/2006 ~ 09/05/2006]

  20. Natasha's Dance Orlando Figes
    [26/02/2006 ~ 07/05/2006]

  21. Death In Venice Thomas Mann
    [09/04/2006 ~ 26/04/2006]

  22. Dhammapada
    [22/04/2006 ~ 23/04/2006]

  23. Wanderlust Rebecca Solnit
    [09/04/2006 ~ 22/04/2006]

  24. The Quiet American Graham Greene
    [28/03/2006 ~ 01/04/2006]

  25. Book of Five Rings Miyamoto Musashi
    [12/01/2006 ~ 28/03/2006]

  26. Letters To A Young Poet Rainer Maria Rilke
    [17/03/2006 ~ 18/03/2006]

  27. To Kill A Mockingbird Harper Lee
    [12/03/2006 ~ 15/03/2006]

  28. Master And Commander Patrick O'Brian
    [04/03/2006 ~ 08/03/2006]

  29. Kim Rudyard Kipling
    [16/02/2006 ~ 23/02/2006]

  30. Break, Blow, Burn Camille Paglia
    [25/12/2005 ~ 09/02/2996]

  31. The Night Watch Sarah Waters
    [26/01/2006 ~ 29/01/2006]

  32. The New York Trilogy Paul Auster
    [07/01/2006 ~ 16/01/2006]

  33. The Deptford Trilogy Robertson Davis
    [03/12/2005 ~ 14/01/2006]

  34. Meditations Marcus Aurelius
    [30/12/2005 ~ 05/01/2006]

  35. Fruits of the Earth Andre Gide
    [01/01/2006 ~ 05/01/2006]

  36. The Burial at Thebes: Sophocles's Antigone
    translated by Seamus Heaney
    [26/12/2005 ~ 26/12/2005]
    & The Three Theban Plays: "Antigone","Oedipus the King","Oedipus at Colonus"
    translated by Robert Fagles
    [26/12/2005 ~ 31/12/2005]

  37. The Prophet Khalil Ghibran
    [26/12/2005 ~ 30/12/2005]

  38. Taras Bulba Nikolai Gogol
    [17/12/2005 ~ 26/12/2005]

  39. Twenty Love Poems and A Song of Despair Pablo Neruda
    [09/12/2005 ~ 10/12/2005]

  40. The Four Quartets T. S. Eliot
    [01/12/2005 ~ 09/12/2005]

  41. A Room of One's Own Virginia Woolf
    [25/11/2005 ~ 03/12/2005]

  42. Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit Jeanette Winterson
    [23/11/2005 ~ 25/11/2005]

  43. The Claudine Novels Colette
    [22/07/2005 ~ 30/08/2005]

  44. Death and the Dervish Meša Selimović
    translated by Bogdan Rakić & Stephen Dickey
    [17/11/2006 ~

  45. Yogasutra of Patanjali

  46. Dracula Bram Stoker
    [25/10/2006 ~

  47. The Black Book Orhan Pamuk
    [17/10/2006 ~

  48. War and Peace Leo Tolstoy
    translated by Anthony Briggs
    [18/06/2006 ~

  49. Stories Anton Chekhov
    translated by Richard Pevear & Larissa Volokhonsky
    [11/08/2006 ~

  50. New Annotated Sherlock Holmes Arthur Conan Doyle
    Volume I:
    [29/05/2006 ~

  51. Don Quixote Miguel De Cervantes
    [26/01/2006 ~

  52. Maximum City Suketu Mehta
    [29/04/2006 ~

  53. Moby Dick Herman Melville
    [12/07/2005 ~

  54. A Crack in the Edge of the World : America and the Great California Earthquake of 1906 Simon Winchester

  55. Anna Karenina Leo Tolstoy

  56. The Idiot Fyodor Dostoevsky

  57. The Double and The Gambler Fyodor Dostoevsky

  58. Steppenwolf Herman Hesse

  59. Norwegian Woods Haruki Murakami

  60. The Claudius Novels Robert Graves

  61. Nightwood Djuna Barnes

  62. Perfume Patrick Suskind

  63. The House of Mirth Edith Wharton

  64. The Iliad Homer

  65. The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter Carson McCullers

  66. The Valleys of the Assassins and Other Persian Travels Freya Stark

  67. The Wings of the Dove Henry James

  68. Great Expectations Charles Dickens

  69. Of Human Bondage W. Somerset Maugham

  70. Jane Eyre Charlotte Bronte

  71. A Fine Balance Rohinton Mistry

  72. Midnight's Children Salman Rushdie

  73. The Sun Also Rises Ernest Hemingway

  74. Memoirs of Hadrian Marguerite Yourcenar

  75. The Three Musketeers Alexandre Dumas

  76. Complete Father Brown G. K. Chesterton

  77. Captain Alatriste Arturo Perez-Reverte

  78. Lolita Vladimir Nabokov

  79. The Myths Boxset: "A Short History of Myth," "The Penelopiad" & "Weight" Karen Armstrong, Margaret Atwood & Jeanette Winterson

  80. The House of the Seven Gables Nathaniel Hawthorne

  81. Blindness Jose Saramago

  82. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell Susanna Clarke

  83. The Complete Short Novels Anton Chekhov

  84. Unbearable Lightness of Being Milan Kundera

  85. Fall on Your Knees Ann-Marie MacDonald

  86. Guns, Germs and Steel Jared Diamond

  87. Art of War Sun Tzu

  88. Seven Storey Mountain Thomas Merton

  89. Stiff Mary Roach
  90. Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee Dee Brown

  91. A History of God Karen Armstrong

  92. The Places that Scares You Pema Chodron

  93. The Histories Herodotus

  94. Bhagavad Gita

  95. An Autobiography: The Story of My Experiments with Truth Mohandas Gandhi

  96. Saint Francis of Assisi G. K. Chesterton

  97. From the Holy Mountain William Dalrymple

  98. The Collected Tales of Nikolai Gogol Nikolai Gogol

  99. Dead Souls Nikolai Gogol

  100. Orlando Virginia Woolf



P/S: The 100 Books To Read List for 2006 has been amended from time to time. Hence, Version 4.0. If anyone is interested, the original list is available here.

10 comments:

Unknown said...

From your list,

I have read a measely one book - Lolita.

But i have watched two - Great Expectations and Unbearable Lightness of Being.

So does that count as 3? Or still 1?

Am planning on acquiring a copy of "Crying out Love in the centre of the world" to read. Flipped through a page yesterday, every sentence is so tragic! Must read! Wannabe depressives must read tragic books! The Japanese version somemore, i'll be lucky to finish it in 2 months.

Anonymous said...

Hey. How have you been since Howl?
Liked your list and greeted two titles with the kind of bitter-sweet surprise one reserves for books one remembers fondly for wanting very much to read long, long ago and never actually having read - Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee (Dee Brown), and The Snow Leopard (Peter Matthiessen). A handful of the other ones on your list are on my present list too. Wanderlust (Rebecca Solnit) is the newest addition to my list, but I don't think I'll get to it this year. Good luck to you, though :).

Anonymous said...

Forgot to add that George R R Martin was on my 'last books to borrow before membership at uni library expires' list...Am still tempted to actually read those books...

darkorpheus said...

Hey Elaine,

Why don't you just pick up "Dracula" or something and make it a good Number 2?

How's your back?

precious said...

hey, if u haven't bought letters to a young poet, don't buy. i have.

Anonymous said...

jonathan strange.. i love that book..

darkorpheus said...

Heard many good things about "Jonathan Strange", but just can't seem to find the time to get around to reading it - YET.

Rebecca H. said...

This is truly an awesome list -- varied and interesting. I might have to steal some books from off it. I loved Rebecca Solnit's Wanderlust, by the way.

darkorpheus said...

Hi Dorothy W. Thanks, I keep changing a few titles from time to time though.

BTW, if you have time, you might like to try Rebecca Solnit's A Field Guide To Getting Lost (if you have not already.)

Personally I find it much better than Wanderlust. It's more personal, but it's amazing how she can expand the personal to a thoughtful exposition on a subject.

The Traveller said...

Your list is pretty impressive! My own list of books to read (not in 2007, just within my lifetime) is on Amazon and runs to 11 pages. I love it that Neruda and Marquez are on your list, and can't wait to hear what you think of both!