The Books that Shaped the Century Collection comprises 100 books from the twentieth century deemed by a panel of publishers, librarians and booksellers to have "significantly influenced the way people thought and acted, and thus influenced the course of history for better or worse" Gordon Graham, LOGOS 20th Century Books Project.
The panel - members of the advisory board of LOGOS, the international book publishing journal - selected the titles after considering the 500 books recommended as "books of the century" by a variety of newspapers and institutions including The New York Times Book Review and Waterstones bookshops.
The resulting collection encompasses a range of titles that includes two children's books, five plays, books concerned with the social sciences and science including psychology, politics, medicine, physics, management, philosophy, architecture, environment, feminism and history.
The collection has been exhibited around Europe and the UK and is now permanently housed in Oxford Brookes University Library, John Henry Brookes Building, Level 2, Zone C.
Choose from the date ranges below to view the titles included in the collection.
Books that Shaped the Century 1900 - 1925
1900
CONRAD, Joseph (Teodor Josef Konrad Korzeniowski) (1857-1924) Lord Jim
FREUD, Sigmund(1856-1939) Die Traumdeutung (The Interpretation of Dreams)
1901
CHEKHOV, Anton P (1860-1904) Tri sestry (The Three Sisters)
1902
LENIN, Vladimir Ilyich (1870-1924) Chto delat? (What Is to Be Done?)
1908
GRAHAME, Kenneth (1859-1932) The Wind in the Willows
1910
CURIE, Marie Sklodowska (1867-1934) Traité de radioactivité (Treatise on Radioactivity)
1911
TAYLOR, Frederick Winslow (1856-1915) The Principles of Scientific Management
1913
WHITEHEAD, Alfred North (1861-1947) and RUSSELL, Bertrand (1872-1970) Principia Mathematica (3 vols)
LAWRENCE, David Herbert (1885-1930) Sons and Lovers (also Lady Chatterley's Lover 1928)
1918
EINSTEIN, Albert (1879-1955) Das Relativitätsprinzip: eine Sammlung von Abhandlungen (The Principle of Relativity: A Collection of Original Memoirs on the Special and General Theory of Relativity)
STOPES, Marie (1880-1958) Married Love
1920
WEBER, Max (1864-1920) Die protestantische Ethik und der Geist des Kapitalismus (The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism)
1922
HASEK, Jaroslaw (1883-1923) Osudy dobrého vojáka Svejka za Svétové války (The Good Soldier Schweik)
ELIOT, T(homas) S(tearns) (1888-1965) The Waste Land
JOYCE, James (1882-1941) Ulysses
1923
LE CORBUSIER (Charles-Edouard Jeanneret) (1887-1965) Vers une Architecture (Toward a New Architecture)
1924
MANN, Thomas (1875-1955) Der Zauberberg (The Magic Mountain)
1925
FITZGERALD, F(rancis) Scott (1896-1940) The Great Gatsby
English KAFKA, Franz (1883-1924) Der Prozess (The Trial) (also Das Schloss (The Castle) 1926)
Books that Shaped the Century 1926 - 1944
1926
HITLER, Adolf (1889-1945) Mein Kampf (My Struggle)
LAWRENCE, T(homas) E(dward) (1888-1935) The Seven Pillars of Wisdom
MILNE, A(lan) A(lexander) (1882-1956) Winnie-the-Pooh
1927
PROUST, Marcel (1871-1922) A la recherche du temps perdu (In search of lost time) (16 vols)
GANDHI, Mohandas K (1869-1948) Mor Satya Anvesanar Kahini (The Story of My Experiments with Truth)
WOOLF, Virginia (1882-1941) To the Lighthouse
1928
ELLIS, (Henry) Havelock (1859-1939) Studies in the Psychology of Sex (7 vols)
MEAD, Margaret (1901-1978) Coming of Age in Samoa
1929
FAULKNER, William (1897-1962) The Sound and the Fury
HEMINGWAY, Ernest (1899-1961) A Farewell to Arms (also For Whom the Bell Tolls 1940)
REMARQUE, Erich Maria (1898-1970) Im Westen nichts Neues (All Quiet on the Western Front)
1932
HUXLEY, Aldous (1894-1963) Brave New World
1933
MALRAUX, André (1901-1976) La Condition Humaine (Man's Fate)
1936
KEYNES, John Maynard (1883-1946) A General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money
1937
CARNEGIE, Dale (1888-1955) How to Win Friends and Influence People
1938
SARTRE, Jean-Paul (1905-1980) La Nausée (Nausea)
1939
STEINBECK, John (1902-1968) The Grapes of Wrath
1940
GREENE, Graham (1904-1991) The Power and the Glory (also The Heart of the Matter 1948)
KOESTLER, Arthur (1905-1983) Darkness at Noon
RIGHT, Richard (1908-1960) Native Son
1941
BRECHT, Bertolt (1898-1956) Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder (Mother Courage and Her Children)
BURNHAM, James (1905-1987) The Managerial Revolution
1942
CAMUS, Albert (1913-1960) L'étranger (The Outsider) (also La Peste (The Plague) 1947)
1943
SARTRE, Jean-Paul (1905-1980) L'Etre et le néant (Being and Nothingness) (also L'existentialisme est on humanisme (Existentialism and Humanism) 1946)
1944
HAYEK, Frederic (Friedrich A von) (1899-1992) The Road to Serfdom
Books that Shaped the Century 1945 - 1955
1945
POPPER, Karl (1902-1994) The Open Society and Its Enemies
ORWELL, George (Eric Arthur Blair) (1903-1950) Animal Farm (also Nineteen Eighty-Four 1949)
1946
SPOCK, Benjamin (1903-1998) The Common-sense Book of Baby and Child Care
1947
FRANK, Anne (1929-1945) Dutch Het Achterhuis: Dagboekbrieven 12 Juni 1942 - I Augustus 1944 (The diary of a young girl)
1948
KINSEY, Alfred C (1894-1956) Sexual Behavior in the Human Male
PATON, Alan (1903-1988) Cry, the Beloved Country
WIENER, Norbert (1894-1964) Cybernetics
1949
BEAUVOIR, Simone de (1908-1986) Le deuxième sexe (The Second Sex)
French GOMBRICH, E(rnest) H (1909- ) The Story of Art
MISES, Ludwig von (1881-1973) Human Action
UNITED NATIONS The Universal Declaration of Human Rights English
1951
SALINGER, J(erome) D(avid) (1919- ) The Catcher in the Rye
1952
BECKETT, Samuel (1906-1989) En attendant Godot (Waiting for Godot)
1953
WITTGENSTEIN, Ludwig (1889-1951) Untersuchungen (Philosophical Investigations)
1954
CHURCHILL, Winston (1874-1965) The Second World War (6 vols)
GOLDING, William (1911- ) Lord of the Flies
MAO, Ze Dong (earlier spelling "Tse-Tung") (1893-1976) The Thoughts of Chairman Mao
THOMAS, Dylan (1914 -1953) Under Milk Wood
1955
LEVI-STRAUSS, Claude (1908- ) Tristes tropiques (A World on the Wane) (also La pensée sauvage (The Savage Mind)1962)
NABOKOV, Vladimir (1899-1977) Lolita
Books that Shaped the Century 1956 - 1964
1956
O'NEILL, Eugene (1888-1953) American Long Day's journey Into Night
TOLKIEN, J(ohn) R(onald) (1892-1973) The Lord of the Rings (3 vols)
1957
HOGGART, Richard (1918- ) The Uses of Literacy
KEROUAC, Jack (1922-1969) On the Road
PACKARD, Vance (1914-) The Hidden Persuaders
PARKINSON, C Northcote (1909-1993) Parkinson's Law
PASTERNAK, Borìs (1890-1960) Doctor Zhivago (Il Dottor Zivago)
1958
ACHEBE, Chinua (1930-) Things Fall Apart
GALBRAITH, John K (1908-) The Affluent Society
1959
GRASS, Günter (1927-) Die Blechtrommel (The Tin Drum)
SNOW, C(harles) P(ercy) (1905-1980) The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution
1961
HELLER, Joseph (1923- ) Catch-22
1962
BALDWIN, James (1924-1998) Another Country
BURGESS, Anthony (John Anthony Burgess Wilson) (1917-1993) Clockwork Orange
CARSON, Rachel (1907-1964) Silent Spring
JUNG, Carl Gustav (1875-1961) Erinnerungen, Träume, Gedanken(Memories, Dreams, Reflections)
SOLZHENITSYN, Aleksandr (1918-) Odin den Ivana Denisovicha (One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich) also Arkhipelag Gulag (The Gulag Archipelago) 1973)
1963
FRIEDAN, Betty (1921-1999) The Feminine Mystique
MCNEILL, William (1917- ) The Rise of the West
1964
US SURGEON GENERAL Smoking and Health
Books that Shaped the Century 1967 - 1994
1967
GARCÍA MÁRQUEZ, Gabriel (1928-) Cien anos de soledad (One Hundred Years of Solitude)
MCLUHAN, Marshal (1911-1980) with Quentin Fiore The Medium Is the Massage
MORRIS, Desmond (1928- ) The Naked Ape
1968
WATSON, James D (1928- ) The Double Helix
1970
GREER, Germaine (1939- ) The Female Eunuch
1973
SCHUMACHER, E(rnst) F (1911-1977) Small Is Beautiful
1974
DRUCKER, Peter F (1909- ) Management: Tasks, Responsibilities and Practices
1980
ECO, Umberto (1932- ) Italian Il nome della rosa (The Name of the Rose)
1984
KUNDERA, Milan (1929- ) Nesnesitelná lehkost byti (The Unbearable Lightness of Being)
1987
HAVEL, Václav (1936- ) Living in Truth
1988
HAWKING, Stephen W (1942- ) A Brief History of Time
RUSHDIE, Salman (1947- ) The Satanic Verses
1994
MANDELA, Nelson (1918- ) Long Walk to Freedom
