ThinkingWest: Great Books Lists

The 10 Year Reading Plan for the Great Books of the Western World

ThinkingWest — Sun, 29 Jun 2025 10:39:08 GMT

Approaching the Great Books of the Western World can be quite daunting. Luckily the editors of the set provided a reading plan spanning 10 years. Although a decade of study sounds terrifying, know that this is simply a suggestion for those serious in studying the GBWW set. Casual readers can further down-select from the following reading plan. A good go…

World’s Best Reading Series by Reader’s Digest

ThinkingWest — Tue, 24 Jun 2025 23:08:51 GMT

Beginning in 1982, Reader’s Digest began publishing annual volumes of the “best reading” series. Selecting from fiction classics heavily from the 19th and 20th centuries, Reader’s Digest has produced decorative volumes including custom artwork and author biographies with increasing frequency moving to bi-monthly editions in 1984. Since 1995, new edition…

The Great Books of Christianity

ThinkingWest — Mon, 23 Jun 2025 23:53:11 GMT

Since it is likely that no other topic has been written about in the West more than Christianity, one might conclude that western literature and Christianity are inseparable. Perhaps no other faith has inspired, and been inspired by, great literature quite like Christianity. The list aims to aggregate the most influential Christian books of theology, ph…

Where to Read Classic Books for Free

ThinkingWest — Mon, 23 Jun 2025 23:51:57 GMT

There’s no such thing as free lunch, but luckily you can read many of the greatest books mankind has produced for free online. Here is a list with links to online resources for reading many of the classic works found in great books sets, like the Harvard Classics and the Great Books of the Western World.

Americanliterature.com: Though the name suggests o…

Little Leather Library

ThinkingWest — Mon, 23 Jun 2025 23:50:56 GMT

The Little Leather Library refers to originally leather-bound, miniature editions of classic books printed by the Little Leather Library Corporation between 1916 and the early 1920s. Free editions of Shakespearian plays included in tobacco purchases from a cigarette company inspired brothers Charles and Albert Boni to devise their own prototype of a min…

The International Collectors Library

ThinkingWest — Mon, 23 Jun 2025 23:49:35 GMT

The International Collectors Library is a classic book set published by Doubleday Book & Music Club beginning in the 1940s. Hundreds of editions were published over its approximately four decades of printing. Very little information is available about this set; hence, this page aims to document what little can be gleaned.

Books in this set were generally…

The Susan Wise Bauer Classics List

ThinkingWest — Mon, 23 Jun 2025 23:34:52 GMT

The Well-Educated Mind by Susan Wise Bauer guides readers through their first steps in a self-motivated classical education by reading through famous works in four genres: novels, autobiographies, histories, and drama. Her book contains a great list for those interested in expanding their education by reading books that have greatly impacted western civ…

The Jordan B. Peterson Book List

ThinkingWest — Mon, 23 Jun 2025 23:33:40 GMT

Needing little introduction to most, Jordan B. Peterson is a Canadian clinical psychologist who took the world by storm over the past few years with his cultural, political, and religious lectures across the globe. Rising to fame from his protest of Canada’s anti-free speech laws regarding “misgendering”, Peterson wrote his bestselling book 12 Rules for…

The Easton Press 100 Greatest Books Ever Written

ThinkingWest — Mon, 23 Jun 2025 23:31:45 GMT

What originally began by Easton Press as a list of the 100 “greatest books” ever written, has actually grown to include 125 works. While any top 100 list is bound to be contested, with countless advocates wondering why their favorite work was excluded, any work on the list below is bound to be a work that has significantly impacted western civilization.

…

Encyclopedia Britannica’s Great Books of the Western World

ThinkingWest — Mon, 23 Jun 2025 11:02:17 GMT

The following list is one of the most famous book lists around. The set was compiled and published by Encyclopedia Britannica in 1952, and the second edition, which expanded on the original body of work, was released in 1990. A competitor to the Harvard’s Classics set, the Great Books of the Western World (GBWW) comprises well over 100 of the greatest w…

The Harvard Classics

ThinkingWest — Mon, 23 Jun 2025 10:56:29 GMT

Perhaps the best known classic book anthology of the 20th century was the Harvard Classics (a.k.a Harvard Universal Classics or Dr. Eliot’s Five Foot Shelf), compiled by Harvard University president Charles W. Eliot in 1909. Published by P.F. Collier and Son, the anthology aimed to provide a complete liberal education in 51 volumes.

The list below is an …

The Franklin Library’s Great Books

ThinkingWest — Mon, 23 Jun 2025 10:40:39 GMT

The Franklin Library’s Great Books of the Western World (GBWW) is identical (or very close) to the Encyclopedia Britannica’s 1952 version of the GBWW. However, it appears the Franklin Library edition has reorganized some of the works, often breaking volumes originally containing multiple works into separate volumes. The Franklin Library’s 96 full leathe…

The Great Books Lists: Start Here

ThinkingWest — Mon, 23 Jun 2025 10:29:19 GMT

The following “great books” lists are among the most famous ones compiled for familiarizing a reader with the West’s most influential ideas.

The first two, the Great Books of the Western World (GBWW) and The Harvard Classics are physical sets sold in various editions throughout the 20th century. Both cover a wide range of novels, nonfiction, poetry, and …