Famous Books and When They Were Written

Mesopotamian poem written on clay tablets about a king's friendship and his search for immortality

Ancient funerary text containing spells to guide the deceased through the afterlife

Ancient collection of Sanskrit hymns and rituals forming the oldest Hindu scriptures

Babylonian creation epic recited during the New Year festival in ancient Mesopotamia

Chinese divination manual of sixty-four hexagrams, later read as a book of philosophy and change

Greek epic attributed to Homer, covering the final year of the Trojan War and the wrath of Achilles

Greek epic poem following Odysseus's ten-year journey home after the fall of Troy

Poem by Hesiod that describes the origins and genealogy of the Greek gods

Didactic poem by Hesiod on farming, justice and honest work, addressed to his own brother

Ancient Chinese military treatise attributed to Sun Tzu on strategy and tactics

Late Vedic Sanskrit texts that explore philosophical concepts such as Brahman and Atman

Work by Herodotus that records the Greco Persian wars and the customs of many peoples

Thucydides' account of the long war between Athens and Sparta, written by a general who fought in it

Sanskrit epic of the dynastic war between two branches of one family, the longest poem ever composed

Chinese classic text attributed to Laozi outlining the principles of the Tao

Platonic dialogue set in the prison on the last day of the life of Socrates

Philosophical treatise by Plato exploring justice and the ideal structure of a city state

Aristotle's examination of virtue, habit and what it means to live a good life

Treatise by Aristotle that analyzes the structure and purpose of tragic drama

Sanskrit epic telling of Rama's search for his wife Sita after she is carried off by a demon king

Collection of short verses of the Buddha's teaching, the most widely read Buddhist text there is

Collection of sayings and exchanges attributed to Confucius, set down by his disciples after his death

Sanskrit scripture that forms part of the Mahabharata and presents a dialogue on duty

Latin epic by Virgil that traces the journey of the Trojan hero Aeneas to Italy

Latin narrative poem by Ovid gathering the myths in which someone is changed into something else

Ethnographic treatise by Tacitus describing the tribes living beyond the Roman frontier on the Rhine

Historical work by Tacitus covering the Roman Empire from Tiberius to Nero

Latin novel by Apuleius about a man turned into a donkey and the year he spends trying to change back

Private notebook of the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius, written in Greek on campaign for himself alone

Collection of Hebrew and Greek texts forming the foundational scriptures of Judaism and Christianity

Old English epic poem about a hero who defeats the monster Grendel and later a dragon in Scandinavia

Persian national epic of fifty thousand couplets, tracing the kings of Iran from creation to the Arab conquest

Japanese court narrative following a prince and his descendants, often called the first novel written anywhere

Seven-volume work explaining vision as light traveling in straight lines from objects to the eye

Survey of who held what land in England, compiled for the Norman king within twenty years of the conquest

Old French epic poem recounting the Battle of Roncevaux Pass and the death of Charlemagne's nephew

Middle High German epic about the hero Siegfried and the destruction of the Burgundian royal family

Collection of Welsh prose tales including the Four Branches and Arthurian stories from medieval manuscripts

Persian poem of some twenty-five thousand couplets by Rumi, a sequence of stories carrying Sufi teaching

Account of twenty-four years across Asia and the court of Kublai Khan, written down in a Genoese prison

Italian narrative poem describing a journey down through hell and up through purgatory to paradise, written in exile

Italian collection of one hundred tales told by ten young people sheltering from the Black Death near Florence

Middle English allegorical poem about a dreamer searching for the true Christian life amid social corruption

Middle English romance in which a green stranger offers a knight one axe blow now for another a year later

Collection of stories told by pilgrims traveling to the shrine of Thomas Becket at Canterbury Cathedral in England

Arabic frame story of a queen telling tales nightly to postpone her execution, gathered over many centuries

Devotional handbook of short chapters on humility and the inner life, written for monks and read far beyond them

English compilation of Arthurian legends assembled from French and English sources by Thomas Malory

Latin satire in which Folly herself praises folly, mocking churchmen and scholars alike from inside the church

Italian epic poem continuing the story of Roland with knights, magic, and battles during Charlemagne's wars

Latin work describing an ideal island society with communal property and religious tolerance

French series of satirical novels about two giants and their adventures with humor and learning

Italian political treatise offering advice to rulers on acquiring and maintaining power in Renaissance Italy

French collection of short personal enquiries into everything from cannibals to thumbs, which invented the form

English play about a scholar who sells his soul to the devil in exchange for twenty-four years of power

English allegorical poem celebrating Queen Elizabeth and the virtues of chivalry through knightly quests

Chinese novel of a monk traveling to India for scriptures, guarded by a monkey with a magic staff

English history play depicting the rise and fall of the last Plantagenet king of England

English comedy involving Athenian lovers, fairies, and a group of amateur actors in a forest

Tragedy of two young lovers from feuding households in Verona, killed by a message that arrives too late

English tragedy about a Danish prince who seeks revenge for his father's murder by his uncle

Spanish novel about an elderly gentleman who reads too much chivalry and sets out as a knight himself

Tragedy of a Scottish thane who murders his king on a prophecy and cannot stop killing afterwards

Epic poem recounting the biblical story of the fall of man through Satan's rebellion and temptation of Adam and Eve

Novel about a shipwrecked sailor who survives alone on a tropical island for decades before rescue

Satirical novel following Lemuel Gulliver through voyages to lands of tiny people giants and talking horses

Novel centered on Elizabeth Bennet and her evolving relationship with the wealthy Mr Darcy in Regency England

Novel about a scientist who creates a living being from assembled body parts and then abandons his creation

Novel set in Puritan Massachusetts about a woman forced to wear a symbol of shame after an adulterous affair

Novel recounting Captain Ahab's obsessive quest to kill the white whale that maimed him on a previous voyage

Novel depicting the harsh realities of slavery in the American South through interconnected family stories

Novel following a provincial doctor's wife whose romantic fantasies lead to debt and despair in rural France

Novel set during the French Revolution contrasting London and Paris through the lives of several intertwined characters

Novel tracing the life of orphan Pip from humble beginnings to unexpected wealth and eventual self-discovery

Novel about a girl who falls down a rabbit hole into a world of talking animals and absurd logic puzzles

Novel of a poor student who murders a pawnbroker to prove a theory, and cannot live with it

Novel following the four March sisters as they grow up in Civil War era New England with their mother

Epic novel chronicling Russian aristocratic families during the Napoleonic invasion and its aftermath

Novel exploring the tragic affair of a married Russian aristocrat and the contrasting life of a landowner

Novel following a runaway boy and an escaped slave rafting down the Mississippi River

Novel about a handsome young man whose portrait ages while he remains youthful and descends into vice

Novel presented through letters and diaries about a Transylvanian count who moves to England to prey on victims

Novel about a Kansas girl transported by tornado to a magical land where she seeks the wizard's help

Play about a boy who refuses to grow up and leads children to a magical island of pirates and fairies

Novella in which a traveling salesman wakes as an enormous insect and his family slowly stops feeding him

Novel narrated by a bond salesman observing the mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby on Long Island

Novel depicting a totalitarian future society where the government controls truth and monitors citizens

Epic fantasy novel following hobbits on a quest to destroy a powerful ring and defeat an evil lord

Novel of an Igbo village and the arrival of missionaries, written to answer European accounts of Africa

Novel told through a girl's eyes as her father defends a Black man accused of assault in the South

Novel of seven generations in a town where the extraordinary is reported in the same tone as the weather