Essential reading

[LilBastage]

What are some of the works that you would absolutely have to have in your library? I'm including Classics, American Literature, International Literature, Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories, Historical Texts, etc.

I'll start with a few of mine:

Common Sense by Thomas Paine
Writings and texts of Abraham Lincoln
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (I'd include about a dozen or so other works by Twain as well)
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Moby Dick by Melville
Most of Poe's works


That's just a starter for me. How about everyone else?

 

[BigJake6904]

Bleachers by John Grisham
A Call to Arms by Ernest Hemingway

 

[Wurm]

For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway
Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo
Tales of a Traveller by Washington Irving
Leatherstocking Tales by James Fenimore Cooper
Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
The Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss
The Once and Future King by T. H. White

those are just a few.

 

[AVB]

Catcher in the Rye - J. D. Salinger

 

[Gator]

The South was Right! by 2 Kennedy brothers (i kid you not)
Atlas Shrugged (my all time favorite) by Ann Rynd (sp?)
Under the Bleachers - Seemore Butts

 

[Double D]

Johny tremain cant think of the author right now. there are many more but when I was young this was mandatory reading in school and it was well worth it.

 

[jlada]

Art Of War - Sun Tzu
Il Principe - Niccolo Machiavelli
Ulysses - James Joyce
War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
Commedia - Dante Alighieri
Common Sense - Thomas Paine


Many more.

 

[yanksfan]

The Federalist Papers by "Publius" (Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay)

Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut

The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson & Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain

In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

Profiles in Courage by John F. Kennedy

The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway

Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

 

[NiteSeer]

I would include the Aubrey/Maturin Novels by Patrick O'Brian. These are sea fearing Historical novels and a fun read. He wrote 21 in this series.
I have read 20.

Also, any books my James A Michener-Hawaii, The Source and ect.

2001 Odyssey by Authur Clark is a classic scienfition novel

The Bible, enough said

Mozart by Maynard Solomon, If u love Mozart, you will love this book.

 

[mrjinglesusa]

Add to the list:

100 Years of Solitude (Gabriel García Márquez)

 

[NiteSeer]

2001 Odyssey -Arthur Clarke and science fiction. Sorry about the misspellings.

 

[Strayvector]

Green Eggs and Ham

 

[bfreebern]

The Fountainhead - Ann Rand

Oh the thinks you can think - Dr Seuss

 

[jgohlke]

Atlas Shrugged
The Founainhead also by AR - one of the few great books that is also a great movie
Hitchhikers Guide
Illusions by Richard Bach
The Hobbit (and the Lord of the Rings trilogy)
2001 - another great book that's a great movie

 

[StinkiMonki]

Catch-22 (Heller)
LOTR (Tolkien)

 

[mysterea]

That hasn't been mentioned yet?

Mutant Message Down Under By Marlo Morgan
Into Thin Air By John Krakaur
Access All Areas By Ninjalicious
Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage By Alfred Lansing
Ishmael by Daniel Quinn

 

[ChiTown_Huck]

In no particular order:

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Ken Kesey

Count of Monte Cristo, Dumas

Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe

Tao Te Ching, Lao Tzu

A Short History of Nearly Everything, Bill Bryson

...I know there is more, I just can't think of them right now.

 

[Lightninrod]

The South was Right! by 2 Kennedy brothers (i kid you not)
Atlas Shrugged (my all time favorite) by Ann Rynd (sp?)
Under the Bleachers - Seemore Butts

Two of my favorites! Not too sure about the third one though.....

If you like action fiction, get all of Lee Child's novels. Andrew Vachss is a great fiction writer that has one of the best 'heroes' I've ever read about.

Reading novels is one of my hobbies(cigars, Bass fishing[artificials only/catch-n-release], collecting colognes) and I read daily.


Dan

 

[garvey]

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas -- Hunter S. Thompson

Das Capital -- Karl Marx

Manufacturing Consent -- Noam Chomsky

Fight Club -- Chuck Palahniuk

The Founding Brothers -- Joseph Ellis

Freakanomics -- Steven Leavitt

 

[dk_ace]

Paradise Lost - John Milton (at least the first three books)
Lord of the Rings Trilogy
The Odyssey - Homer
To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
Inferno - Dante
Any and all CS Lewis

There are plenty of others that are slipping my mind at the moment, but I'll think of them later.

D