Pour une Bibliothèque Idéale by Raymond Queneau
"In the early 1950s Raymond Queneau asked several dozen French authors and critics to list the hundred books they would choose if they had to limit themselves to that number. He reproduced all their responses in the book Pour une Bibliothèque Idéale (Gallimard, 1956), along with the overall top 100 list reproduced above."
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1. First Folio by William Shakespeare
Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies is the 1623 published collection of William Shakespeare's plays. Modern scholars commonly refer to it as the First Folio. Printed in folio...
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2. The Bible by Christian Church
The Authorized King James Version is an English translation of the Christian Bible begun in 1604 and completed in 1611 by the Church of England. Printed by the King's Printer, Robert Barker, the fi...
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3. In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust
Swann's Way, the first part of A la recherche de temps perdu, Marcel Proust's seven-part cycle, was published in 1913. In it, Proust introduces the themes that run through the entire work. The narr...
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4. Essays by Michel de Montaigne
Essays is the title given to a collection of 107 essays written by Michel de Montaigne that was first published in 1580. Montaigne essentially invented the literary form of essay, a short subjectiv...
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5. Gargantua and Pantagruel by Francois Rabelais
The Life of Gargantua and of Pantagruel (in French, La vie de Gargantua et de Pantagruel) is a connected series of five novels written in the 16th century by François Rabelais. It is the story of t...
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6. The Flowers of Evil by Charles Baudelaire
Les Fleurs du mal (English: The Flowers of Evil) is a volume of French poetry by Charles Baudelaire. First published in 1857 (see 1857 in poetry), it was important in the symbolist and modernist mo...
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8. The Works of Moliere by Molière
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière (French pronunciation: [mɔ.ljɛːʁ]; 1622–1673), was a French playwright and actor who is considered to be one of the greatest masters of come...
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9. The Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Confessions is an autobiographical book by Jean-Jacques Rousseau. In modern times, it is often published with the title The Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau in order to distinguish it from St. ...
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10. The Red and the Black by Stendhal
Le Rouge et le Noir (The Red and the Black), subtitled Chronique du XIXe siécle ("Chronicle of the 19th century"), is an historical psychological novel in two volumes by Stendhal, published in 1830...
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11. The Complete Works of Plato by Plato
Plato (pronounced /ˈpleɪtoʊ/) (Greek: Πλάτων, Plátōn, "broad") (428/427 BC[a] – 348/347 BC), was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the ...
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12. The Charterhouse of Parma by Stendhal
Balzac considered it the most important French novel of his time. André Gide later deemed it the greatest of all French novels, and Henry James judged it to be a masterpiece. Now, in a major litera...
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13. The Poems of Francois Villon by François Villon
François Villon (in modern French, pronounced [fʁɑ̃swa vijɔ̃]; in fifteenth-century French, [frɑnswɛ viˈlɔn]) born in Paris in 1431 and disappeared from view in 1463, is the best known French poet ...
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14. Collected Poems by Arthur Rimbaud
'The poet makes himself a seer by a long, prodigious, and rational disordering of all the senses. . .' Rimbaud was sixteen when he made this famous declaration. By 1886, then thirty-two and an expl...
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15. Memoirs of Cardinal De Retz by Cardinal de Retz
Jean François Paul de Gondi, cardinal de Retz (September 29, 1613 – August 24, 1679) was a French churchman, writer of memoirs, and agitator in the Fronde. - Wikipedia
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16. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
Epic in scale, War and Peace delineates in graphic detail events leading up to Napoleon's invasion of Russia, and the impact of the Napoleonic era on Tsarist society, as seen through the eyes of fi...
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17. The Memoirs of the Duke of Saint-Simon on the Reign of Louis XIV. and the Regency by Louis de Rouvroy Saint-Simon (duc de)
Louis de Rouvroy (16 January 1675 – 2 March 1755) commonly known as Saint-Simon was a French soldier, diplomat and writer of memoirs, was born in Paris (Hôtel Selvois, 6 rue Taranne, today at 175 B...
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18. Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes
Alonso Quixano, a retired country gentleman in his fifties, lives in an unnamed section of La Mancha with his niece and a housekeeper. He has become obsessed with books of chivalry, and believes th...
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19. The Complete Plays of Jean Racine by Jean Racine
Jean Racine (French: [ʒɑ̃ ʁasin]), baptismal name Jean-Baptiste Racine (22 December 1639 – 21 April 1699), was a French dramatist, one of the three great playwrights of 17th-century France (along w...
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20. Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus
Prometheus Bound is an Ancient Greek tragedy. In Antiquity, this drama was attributed to Aeschylus, but is now considered by some scholars to be the work of another hand, perhaps one as late as ca....
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20. Seven Against Thebes by Aeschylus
The Seven against Thebes (Greek: Ἑπτά ἐπί Θήβας, Hepta epi Thēbas) is the third play in an Oedipus-themed trilogy produced by Aeschylus in 467 BC. It concerns the battle between an Argive army led ...
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20. The Persians by Aeschylus
The Persians is an Athenian tragedy by the ancient Greek playwright Aeschylus. First produced in 472 BCE, it is the oldest surviving play in the history of theatre. It dramatises the Persian respon...
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20. The Suppliants by Aeschylus
The Suppliants (Greek: Ικέτιδες / Hiketides; also translated as "The Suppliant Maidens") is a play by Aeschylus. It was probably first performed sometime after 470 BC as the first play in a trilogy...
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21. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Dostoevsky's last and greatest novel, The Karamazov Brothers, is both a brilliantly told crime story and a passionate philosophical debate. The dissolute landowner Fyodor Pavlovich Karamazov is mur...
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22. Collected Poems by Stéphane Mallarmé
Stéphane Mallarmé (French: [stefan malaʁme]; 18 March 1842 – 9 September 1898), whose real name was Étienne Mallarmé, was a French poet and critic. He was a major French symbolist poet, and his wor...
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23. Fables of La Fontaine by Jean de La Fontaine
The Fables of Jean de La Fontaine were issued in several volumes from 1668 to 1694. They are classics of French literature. - Wikipedia
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24. Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust is a tragic play, although more appropriately it should be defined a tragicomedy, despite the very title of the work. It was published in two parts: Faust. Der Tr...
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25. Alcools by Guillaume Apollinaire
Guiilaume Apollinaire, a leading figure amongst the young writers and artists in France until his death in 1918, published 'Alcools', his first book of poems, in 1913. With its wide range of verse ...
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26. A Sentimental Education by Gustave Flaubert
The novel describes the life of a young man (Frederic Moreau) living through the revolution of 1848 and the founding of the Second French Empire, and his love for an older woman (based on the wife ...
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27. The Odyssey by Homer
The Odyssey is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is, in part, a sequel to the Iliad, the other work traditionally ascribed to Homer. The poem is fundamental to the m...
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28. Plays by Pierre Corneille
Pierre Corneille (French pronunciation: [pjɛʁ kɔʁnɛj]; 6 June 1606 – 1 October 1684) was a French tragedian, and one of the three great seventeenth-century French dramatists, along with Molière an...
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29. The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri
Belonging in the immortal company of the great works of literature, Dante Alighieri's poetic masterpiece, The Divine Comedy, is a moving human drama, an unforgettable visionary journey through the ...
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30. Memoirs From Beyond the Grave by François René De Chateaubriand
Christmas Summary Classics- This series contains summary of Classic books such as Emma, Arne, Arabian Nights, Pride and prejudice, Tower of London, Wealth of Nations etc. Each book is specially cra...
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31. The Human Comedy by Honoré de Balzac
La Comédie humaine (French pronunciation: [la kɔmedi ymɛn], The Human Comedy) is the title of Honoré de Balzac's (1799–1850) multi-volume collection of interlinked novels and stories depicting Fre...
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32. Oedipus at Colonus by Sophocles
Oedipus at Colonus is one of the three Theban plays of the Athenian tragedian Sophocles. It was written shortly before Sophocles' death in 406 BC and produced by his grandson (also called Sophocles...
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32. Oedipus the King by Sophocles
Oedipus the King is an Athenian tragedy by Sophocles that was first performed c. 429 BC. It was the second of Sophocles's three Theban plays to be produced, but it comes first in the internal chron...
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32. Philoctetes by Sophocles
Philoctetes is a play by Sophocles (Aeschylus and Euripides also each wrote a Philoctetes but theirs have not survived). It was first performed at the Festival of Dionysus in 409 BC, where it won f...
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32. Women of Trachis by Sophocles
Women of Trachis (Ancient Greek: Τραχίνιαι, Trachiniai; also translated as The Trachiniae) is an Athenian tragedy by Sophocles.
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33. Ulysses by James Joyce
Ulysses chronicles the passage of Leopold Bloom through Dublin during an ordinary day, June 16, 1904. The title parallels and alludes to Odysseus (Latinised into Ulysses), the hero of Homer's Odyss...
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34. Dangerous Liaison by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos
The complex moral ambiguities of seduction and revenge make Les Liaisons dangereuses (1782) one of the most scandalous and controversial novels in European literature. Its prime movers, the Vicomte...
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35. Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift
From the preeminent prose satirist in the English language, a great classic recounting the four remarkable journeys of ship's surgeon Lemuel Gulliver. For children it remains an enchanting fantasy;...
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36. One Hundred and One Poems by Paul Verlaine by Paul Verlaine
French poet Paul Verlaine, a major representative of the Symbolist Movement during the latter half of the nineteenth century, was one of the most gifted and prolific poets of his time. Norman Shapi...
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37. Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
For daring to peer into the heart of an adulteress and enumerate its contents with profound dispassion, the author of Madame Bovary was tried for "offenses against morality and religion." What shoc...
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38. A Season in Hell by Arthur Rimbaud
"With skill and imagination, Bertrand Mathieu gives us an intimacy of the spoken American that allows readers to absorb themselves in Rimbaud's private drama as in an obsessive dream of our own.......
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40. Manon Lescaut by Abbe Prevost
Manon Lescaut (L'Histoire du chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut) is a short novel by French author Abbé Prévost. Published in 1731, it is the seventh and final volume of Mémoires et aventures...
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41. Selected Poems by Pierre Ronsard
One of France's most influential love poets, Pierre de Ronsard embraced a variety of themes from politics, science, and philosophy to bawdy and risqué material that outraged religious reformers. Dr...
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42. Lysistrata by Aristophanes
This classic comedy — from the 5th century BC — concerns the vow of Greek women to withhold sex from their husbands until the men agree to end the disastrous wars between Athens and Sparta. An exub...
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42. The Birds by Aristophanes
The Birds (Greek: Ὄρνιθες Ornithes) is a comedy by the Ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes. It was performed in 414 BC at the City Dionysia where it won second prize. It has been acclaimed by mod...
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42. The Clouds by Aristophanes
The Clouds (Ancient Greek: Νεφέλαι Nephelai) is a comedy written by the celebrated playwright Aristophanes lampooning intellectual fashions in classical Athens. It was originally produced at the Ci...
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43. Annals by Cornelius Tacitus
The Annals (Latin: Annales) is a history book by Tacitus covering the reign of the four Roman Emperors succeeding to Caesar Augustus. The parts of the work that survived from antiquity cover most o...
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43. Histories by Cornelius Tacitus
This edition, first published in 2002, provides a commentary suitable for students on the Latin text of Histories Book II.
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45. Poems of Friedrich Hölderlin by Friedrich Holderlin
Poetry. Translated from the German by James Mitchell. Readers of these carefully crafted translations by James Mitchell will profit not only by their economy and clarity of expression, but also by ...
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46. Les Filles du feu by Gerard de Nerval
Les Filles du Feu (English: Girls of the Fire) is a collection of short prose works and stories published by the French poet Gérard de Nerval during January 1854, a year before his death. During 18...
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47. Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
A shipwreck’s sole escapee, Robinson Crusoe endures 28 years of solitude on a Caribbean island and manages not only to survive but also to prevail. A warm humanity, evocative details of his struggl...
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48. Confessions by Augustine
Confessions is the name of an autobiographical work, consisting of 13 books, by St. Augustine of Hippo, written between AD 397 and AD 398. Modern English translations of it are sometimes published ...
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49. Maldoror (Les Chants de Maldoror) by Comte de Lautréamont
This macabre but beautiful work, Les Chants de Maldoror, has achieved a considerable reputation as one of the earliest and most extraordinary examples of Surrealist writing.
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50. Les Misérables by Victor Hugo
Les Misérables is a novel by French author Victor Hugo and is widely considered one of the greatest novels of the 19th century. It follows the lives and interactions of several French characters ov...
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51. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
In 1862 Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, a shy Oxford mathematician with a stammer, created a story about a little girl tumbling down a rabbit hole. Thus began the immortal adventures of Alice, perhaps th...
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52. The Complete Writings of Alfred de Musset by Alfred de Musset
Alfred Louis Charles de Musset-Pathay (French: [al.fʁɛd də my.sɛ]; 11 December 1810 – 2 May 1857) was a French dramatist, poet, and novelist. Along with his poetry, he is known for writing La Confe...
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53. The Journal of Jules Renard by Jules Renard
Spanning from 1887 to a month before his death in 1910, The Journal of Jules Renard is a unique autobiographical masterpiece that, though celebrated abroad and cited as a principle influence by wri...
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55. The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
The Idiot is a novel written by the Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky and first published in 1868. It was first published serially in Russian in Russky Vestnik, St. Petersburg, 1868-1869. The Idiot...
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56. Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
The narrative is non-linear, involving several flashbacks, and two primary narrators: Mr. Lockwood and Ellen "Nelly" Dean. The novel opens in 1801, with Mr. Lockwood arriving at Thrushcross Grange,...
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57. The Possessed by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
The Possessed is an 1872 novel by Fyodor Dostoevsky. Though titled The Possessed in the initial English translation, Dostoevsky scholars and later translations favour the titles The Devils or Demon...
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59. The Complete Poetry and Prose of William Blake by William Blake
William Blake (28 November 1757 – 12 August 1827) was an English painter, poet and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of t...
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60. Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
It is a murder story, told from a murder;s point of view, that implicates even the most innocent reader in its enormities. It is a cat-and-mouse game between a tormented young killer and a cheerful...
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61. Parallel Lives by Plutarch
Plutarch's Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans, commonly called Parallel Lives or Plutarch's Lives, is a series of biographies of famous men, arranged in tandem to illuminate their common moral vi...
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62. The Princess of Cleves by Madame de La Fayette
La Princesse de Clèves is a French novel, regarded by many as the beginning of the modern tradition of the psychological novel, and as a great classic work. Its author is generally held to be Madam...
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63. Das Kapital by Karl Marx
Das Kapital: Kritik der politischen Ökonomie (German pronunciation: [das kapiˈtaːl]) (Capital, in the English translation) is an extensive treatise on political economy written in German by Karl Ma...
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64. Adolphe by Benjamin Constant
Adolphe is a privileged and refined young man, bored by the stupidity he perceives in the world around him. After a number of meaningless conquests, he at last encounters Ellenore, a beautiful and ...
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65. The Figaro Trilogy: The Barber of Seville, The Marriage of Figaro, The Guilty Mother by Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais
The Barber of Seville, The Marriage of Figaro and The Guilty Mother were the first plays to use a set of recurring characters who develop over time. They chronicle the slide of the ancien regime in...
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66. Les Tragiques by Agrippa d'Aubigné
Written over some three decades, the alexandrine verse of this epic poem relies on multiple genres as well as stylistic familiarity with the work of the opposing, Catholic poets of the Pléïade, hea...
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68. Poems of Federico García Lorca by Federico García Lorca
Spain's greatest twentieth-century poet and most influencial modernist speaks to a new generation of readers in this revised edition of his complete poetical works. Reprint.
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70. Maximes by François duc de La Rochefoucauld
François VI, Duc de La Rochefoucauld, Prince de Marcillac (French pronunciation: [fʁɑ̃swa də la ʁɔʃfucol]; 15 September 1613 – 17 March 1680) was a noted French author of maxims and memoirs. His i...
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72. Lettres de madame de Sévigné by Marie de Rabutin-Chantal marquise de Sévigné
Marie de Rabutin-Chantal, marquise de Sévigné (5 February 1626 – 17 April 1696) was a French aristocrat, remembered for her letter-writing. Most of her letters, celebrated for their wit and vividne...
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74. Ubu Roi by Alfred Jarry
A stunning, controversial work that immediately outraged audiences with its scatological references during the 1896 premiere, the farce satirizes the tendency of the successful bourgeois to abuse h...
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75. The Collected Works of Paul Valéry by Paul Valéry
Ambroise-Paul-Toussaint-Jules Valéry (French: [pɔl valeʁi]; 30 October 1871 – 20 July 1945) was a French poet, essayist, and philosopher. In addition to his poetry and fiction (drama and dialogues)...
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76. The Provincial Letters by Blaise Pascal
The Provincial Letters is Blaise Pascal's defense of the Jansenist cause against the Jesuit skills of conscience known as casuistry.
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77. The Seven Pillars of Wisdom by T. E. Lawrence
Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Edward Lawrence CB, DSO (16 August 1888 – 19 May 1935), known professionally as T. E. Lawrence, was a British military officer renowned especially for his liaison role dur...
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78. Carmen by Prosper Mérimée
Carmen is a novella by Prosper Mérimée, written and first published in 1845. It has been adapted into a number of dramatic works, including the famous opera by Georges Bizet. - Wikipedia
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80. Fragments by Heraclitus
The wisdom poetry of the ancient Greek poet Heraclitus is collected into a single bilingual volume that covers everything from the nature of matter to human psychology. Reprint.
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81. Marivaux: Three Plays by Pierre Carlet de Chamblain de Marivaux
The plays in this volume are: The Triumph of Love, Changes of Heart, and The Game of Love and Chance. Marivaux was the 4th most-performed playwright at the Comedie-Francais. Time Magazine speculate...
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82. La légende des siècles by Victor Hugo
La Légende des siècles (The Legend of the Ages) is a collection of poems by Victor Hugo, conceived as an immense depiction of the history and evolution of humanity. - Wikipedia
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83. The Trial by Franz Kafka
Written in 1914, The Trial is one of the most important novels of the twentieth century: the terrifying tale of Josef K., a respectable bank officer who is suddenly and inexplicably arrested and mu...
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84. Correspondence by Voltaire
François-Marie Arouet (French: [fʁɑ̃.swa ma.ʁi aʁ.wɛ]; 21 November 1694 – 30 May 1778), known by his nom de plume Voltaire (/voʊlˈtɛər/; French: [vɔl.tɛːʁ]), was a French Enlightenment writer, hist...
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85. Calligrammes by Guillaume Apollinaire
Calligrammes, subtitled Poems of Peace and War 1913-1916, is a collection of poems by Guillaume Apollinaire which was first published in 1918 (see 1918 in poetry). Calligrammes is noted for how the...
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86. Journals: 1889-1913 by André Gide
Beginning with a single entry for the year 1889, when he was twenty, and continuing throughout his life, the Journals of Andre Gide constitute an enlightening, moving, and endlessly fascinating chr...
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87. Fairy Tales and Stories by Hans Christian Anderson
a Danish author and poet noted for his children's stories. These include "The Steadfast Tin Soldier", "The Snow Queen", "The Little Mermaid", "Thumbelina", "The Little Match Girl", and the "The Ugl...
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88. The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas
The Three Musketeers is a novel by Alexandre Dumas, père. It recounts the adventures of a young man named d'Artagnan after he leaves home to become a guard of the musketeers. D'Artagnan is not one ...
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89. History of My Life by Giacomo Casanova
The colorful memoirs of the legendary eighteenth-century lover recall not only his amorous exploits, but also his diverse careers as a gambler, businessman, diplomat, entertainer, politician, con a...
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90. One Thousand and One Nights by India/Iran/Iraq/Egypt
One Thousand and One Nights is a collection of Middle Eastern and South Asian stories and folk tales compiled in Arabic during the Islamic Golden Age. It is often known in English as the Arabian Ni...
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91. Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad
Conrad's great novel of guilt and redemption follows the first mate on board the Patna, a raw youth with dreams of heroism who, in an act of cowardice, abandons his ship. His unbearable guilt and i...
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92. Philosophical Writings by Novalis
Novalis: Philosophical Writings is the first extensive scholarly translation in English from the philosophical work of the late eighteenth-century German Romantic writer Novalis (Friedrich von Hard...
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93. Thus Spake Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche
Thus Spoke Zarathustra: A Book for All and None (German: Also sprach Zarathustra: Ein Buch für Alle und Keinen) is a philosophical novel by German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, composed in four ...
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94. Three plays: The hostage, Crusts, The humiliation of the father by Paul Claudel
Paul Claudel (French: [pɔl klɔdɛl]; 6 August 1868 – 23 February 1955) was a French poet, dramatist and diplomat, and the younger brother of the sculptor Camille Claudel. He was most famous for his ...
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95. Wry-Blue Loves: Les Amours Jaunes by Tristan Corbière
Bilingual edition of Les Amours jaunes and other poems, a fundamental influence on the development of modern American poetry.
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96. Les Contemplations by Victor Hugo
Les Contemplations (The Contemplations) is a collection of poetry by Victor Hugo, published in 1856. It consists of 156 poems in six books. Most of the poems were written between 1841 and 1855, tho...
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97. La Nuit obscure by Jean de la Croix
La nuit noire de l'âme (ou nuit obscure de l'âme) est une expression attribuée à l'origine à Jean de la Croix, et qui désigne une expérience passagère de désolation spirituelle dans l'expérience my...
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98. Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol
Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol, Russian writer, was first published in 1842, and is one of the most prominent works of 19th-century Russian literature. Gogol himself saw it as an "epic poem in prose",...
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99. The Aeneid by Virgil
The Aeneid is a Latin epic poem written by Virgil in the late 1st century BC (29–19 BC) that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who traveled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the...
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100. The Diary of a Country Priest by Georges Bernanos
Recounts the life of a young French country priest who grows to understand his provincial parish while learning spiritual humility himself.
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