How Widely Read Am I?
This is a list of books that was put together by (I think) the BBC. Apparently the average person will only read about six of these in their lifetime. I decided to take up the challenge.
As a general comment, it doesn't make sense to have The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe on the list as a separate item from The Chronicles of Narnia. Nor does it make sense to have Hamlet listed separately from The Complete Works of Shakespeare. In fact, in general, including series on this list is kind of silly, particularly when the series are made of seven books (Narnia, Harry Potter) or 52 books (the Bible; arguably listable as a single book, though).
On this list, I've read 29 of the items and have nine more on my shelves waiting for me. Not bad, I'd say.
I've bolded books that I've read and used italics to denote books that I own and intend to read, but have not gotten around to reading yet. Here's the list.
1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - C.S. Lewis
34 Emma -Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - A.A. Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery (I think I've read this)
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Inferno - Dante
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web - E.B. White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
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November 23rd, 2010 - 11:39
5 To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee
8 Nineteen Eighty Four – George Orwell
10 Great Expectations – Charles Dickens
61 Of Mice and Men – John Steinbeck
70 Moby Dick – Herman Melville
87 Charlotte’s Web – E.B. White
98 Hamlet – William Shakespeare
And every one of them was for school.
November 23rd, 2010 - 14:15
Get to Les Mis right away. I'm not a great fav of great literature, but I count it amongst my favorites.
November 23rd, 2010 - 14:59
59 was fantastic. Do books that I have read and then quit on halfway through count?
November 23rd, 2010 - 16:08
@Kate: I think you have to complete the book for it to count.
@Ecocd: Les Mis is high on my list of books-on-my-shelf-that-I-intend-to-read.
November 23rd, 2010 - 17:53
Blog post: How Widely Read Am I? — http://timsevenhuysen.com/2010/11/23/how...
November 23rd, 2010 - 18:28
@TimSevenhuysen I've read "Pride & Prejudice & Zombies," does that count?
November 23rd, 2010 - 23:04
@RvLeshrac Ha! No.
November 24th, 2010 - 04:30
1 Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings – JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte
5 To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee
6 The Bible
8 Nineteen Eighty Four – George Orwell
10 Great Expectations – Charles Dickens
16 The Hobbit – JRR Tolkien
18 Catcher in the Rye – JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveler’s Wife – Audrey Niffenegger
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams
29 Alice in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows – Kenneth Grahame
33 Chronicles of Narnia – C.S. Lewis
36 The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe – CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner – Khaled Hosseini
40 Winnie the Pooh – A.A. Milne
41 Animal Farm – George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code – Dan Brown
46 Anne of Green Gables – LM Montgomery
49 Lord of the Flies – William Golding
50 Atonement – Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi – Yann Martel
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time – Mark Haddon
61 Of Mice and Men – John Steinbeck
64 The Lovely Bones – Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo – Alexandre Dumas
71 Oliver Twist – Charles Dickens
73 The Secret Garden – Frances Hodgson Burnett
85 Madame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert
87 Charlotte’s Web – E.B. White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven – Mitch Albom
91 Heart of Darkness – Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince – Antoine De Saint-Exupery
94 Watership Down – Richard Adams
97 The Three Musketeers – Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet – William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables – Victor Hugo
November 24th, 2010 - 05:08
Wow, 39? Pretty good. I have to work a bit harder to catch up.
I've been noticing a couple since I posted this that I remember actually having read before, so my number has been going up a little bit.
November 24th, 2010 - 08:38
Whoops, mistake. I actually haven't read Jane Eyre, Little Prince, or Les Mis. So 36.