BBC Book List

A couple of years ago I was tagged in a note on facebook that contained a reading list, that I believe was prepared by the BBC. It was 100 books that everybody should have read. According to the BBC most people would not have read more than 6 of these titles. At the time I had read about 15 and have been working, not exclusively I hasten to add, on reading the remainder of the books on the list. Now, I have finally completed the list, and I would thoroughly recommend following this as a means of expanding the scope of your reading.

I have to admit I had a few reservations about some of the books on the list. However, I have enjoyed almost all of the recommended titles and now have a desire to read other titles by many of these authors. Admittedly some of the books have been challenging, for example ‘Ulysses’ by James Joyce, challenging, but providing a huge sense of achievement when completed. Some of the entries are a little intimidating also, such as the bible or the complete works of Shakespeare. I am sure that the complete works of Shakespeare and the Harry Potter series should not really be considered single entries

I have included the list here (List1) for those people who, like me, find book lists useful. I find that they give me some structure and provide me with exposure to books and authors that I would not perhaps have read otherwise.

I am always introducing my friends to this list, in the first instance usually as an interesting way to see how many they have read, but ultimately to encourage them to read more. I am very much in favour of people reading more, whether it be real, physical books or electronic kindle books. I am sure I will write more about this in the future.

Now that I have finished that list I have moved on to a much more challenging list, based upon my interpretation of the Great books list. Check out the Great books on Wikipedia here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_books

I will post later regarding my progress and more about the list, which seems to expand daily as I include more titles by authors where an entry has been identified purely as works.