Literary Lists
By George Grant

Readers are inveterate and unapologetic list makers. Indeed, according to Umberto Eco, “Lists are the most necessary literary accessories of all.” There are lists of books that must be read. There are lists of books that must be reread. There are lists of books that must be read by others. There are lists of books that must be bought. There are best-seller lists. There are best of the best lists. There are the indispensable book lists—those titles readers might profess to be their preferred companions were they stranded on a desert isle. It seems that list-making simply goes with the territory—it is the natural accompaniment to the shelf life.

T.S. Eliot quipped, “I love reading another reader’s list of favorites. Even when I find I do not share their tastes or predilections, I am provoked to compare, contrast, and contradict. It is a most healthy exercise, and one altogether fruitful.” Here at King’s Meadow, we share that sentiment wholeheartedly. So, we trust you’ll enjoy mulling over, arguing with, and amending the following literary lists:

Modern Non-Fiction List: Compiling a list of the twenty-five best non-fiction modern works is harder than it might appear at first glance—at least partly because most of the really good books written during the last hundred years or so are barely up to the standards of mediocre books written in earlier centuries. But, of course, in accord with God’s good providence, there have been a number of happy literary aberrations. Almost any of the books by G.K. Chesterton, Abraham, Kuyper, Hilaire Belloc, C.S. Lewis, Dorothy Sayers, Niall Ferguson, Arthur Quiller-Couch, or Paul Johnson might have made the list—but we had to start and stop somewhere.

1. Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton
2. The Stone Lectures, Abraham Kuyper
3. Knowing God, J.I. Packer
4. Mont St. Michel and Chartres, Henry Adams
5. The Servile State, Hilaire Belloc
6. Up From Slavery, Booker T. Washington
7. The Birth of the Modern, Paul Johnson
8. Hero Tales of American History, Theodore Roosevelt and Henry Cabot Lodge
9. The Gathering Storm, Winston Churchill
10. A World Torn Apart, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
11. Home, Witold Rybczynski
12. A Texan Looks at Lyndon, J. Evetts Haley
13. How the Other Half Lives, Jacob Riis
14. My Utmost for His Highest, Oswald Chambers
15. I’ll Take My Stand, Donald Davidson, et al.
16. George Whitefield. Arnold Dallimore
17. 84 Charing Cross Road, Helene Hanff
18. The Calvinistic Concept of Culture, Henry Van Til
19. A Wake for the Living, Andrew Lytle
20. A Christian Manifesto, Francis Schaeffer
21. Where Nights Are Longest, Colin Thubron
22. Amusing Ourselves to Death, Neil Postman
23. Civil Rights, Thomas Sowell
24. Essays and Criticisms, Dorothy Sayers
25. Ideas Have Consequences, Richard M. Weaver

Modern Fiction and Verse List: From this close distance, it is very difficult to tell which novels from our time will continue to have relevance in the days to come. Like any list, this one is subjective and reflects our peculiar interests, biases, and concerns. At the same time it is rather wide ranging. Many of the writers included on this list could have had any number of their works listed. And writers such as Robert Penn Warren, Larry Woiwode, T.H. White, Rudyard Kipling, Wendell Berry, Peter Ackroyd, Eudora Welty, Ellis Peters, James Blaylock, Walter Miller, Allen Tate, John Crowe Ransom, and Flannery O’Connor probably should have been included somewhere but there just wasn’t room.

1. Oxford Book of English Verse, Arthur Quiller-Couch
2. The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien
3. The Father Brown Stories, G.K. Chesterton
4. Witch Wood, John Buchan
5. The Four Quartets, T.S. Eliot
6. The Space Trilogy, C.S. Lewis
7. A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
8. The Four Men, Hilaire Belloc
9. Penhally, Caroline Gordon
10. Collected Stories, William Faulkner
11. The Wizzard of Oz, L.Frank Baum
12. Charlotte’s Web, E.B. White
13. Scaramouche, Rafael Sabatini
14. The Name of the Rose, Umberto Eco
15. Kristen Lavransdatter, Sigrid Undset
16. Love in the Ruins, Walker Percy
17. The Velvet Horn, Andrew Lytle
18. The Footsteps at the Lock, Ronald Knox
19. The Weekend Wodehouse, P.G. Wodehouse
20. Falling, Colin Thubron
21. Little House on the Prairie, Laura Ingles Wilder
22. The Anubis Gates, Tim Powers
23. Song of the Lark, Willa Cather
24. Possession, A.S. Byatt
25. At Home in Mitford, Jan Karon

Classic Theology List: Anthony Trollope once asserted that, “A good catalog of the best books is a world of wisdom and adventure, virtue and valor, insight and experience all but for the asking. A young man who prefers other pursuits to the neglect of this goodly catalog may well be akin to the sloth; to be sure he is akin to the fool.” Though the greatest ideas, the most influential concepts, and the most inspiring prose can hardly be reduced to a short list like this, it is a helpful exercise nevertheless.

1. City of God, St. Augustine
2. Confessions, St. Augustine
3. Imitation of Christ, Thomas a Kempis and Gerhard Groote
4. Institutes of Christian Religion, John Calvin
5. Bondage of the Will, Martin Luther
6. Westminster Confession of Faith
7. On the Incarnation, St. Athanasius
8. Merle D’Aubigne, The History of the Reformation
9. Treasury of David, Charles Haddon Spurgeon
10. Revolution and Unbelief, William Groen van Prinsterer
11. John Knox, The History of the Reformation in Scotland
12. Book of Martyrs, John Foxe
13. Religious Affections, Jonathan Edwards
14. The Death of Death, John Owen
15. Christie Magnalia Americana, Cotton Mather
16. Practical Christianity, William Wilberforce
17. Collected Sermons, Thomas Chalmers
18 Journals, George Whitefield
19. Pilgrim’s Progress, John Bunyan
20. Scots Worthies, John Howie
21. A Crook in the Lot, Thomas Boston
22. The Bruised Reed, Richard Sibbes
23. The Life of God in the Soul of Man, Henry Scougal
24. The Covenant of Grace, Matthew Henry
25. The Reformed Pastor, Richard Baxter

Bannockburn Reading Lists: The Bannockburn Literary Fellowship reads through a number of classic works every year. Following Dr. Grant’s four year cycle of Antiquity, Christendom, Modernity, and American, the reading program is not a comprehensive survey of the great Western Canon of literature, but it is a good, healthy survey. Below is a recent sampling of our aggressive reading agenda.

Antiquity:
1.The Epic of Gilgamesh
2. Ryken, Literature of the Bible
3. Wines, The Hebrew Republic
4. Aesop’s Fables
5. Johnson, Rasselas
6. Eddershiem, Temple Worship
7. Plato, Republic
8. Aristotle, Rhetoric, Politics, and Poetics
9. Portable Historians
10. Plays, Aristophanes, Euripides, Sophocles
11. Bulfinch, Mythology
12. Homer, Iliad
13. Homer, Odyssey
14. Plutarch, Noble Lives
15. Sienkiewicz, Quo Vadis
16. Confucius, The Analects
17. Bhagavad Gita
18. Portable Reader
19. Cicero, Orations
20. Sparks, Apostolic Fathers
21. Augustine, City of God

Christendom:
1. Augustine, Confessions
2. Athanasius, On the Incarnation
3. Rushdoony, Foundations of Order
4. Mallory, Le Mort d’Arthur
5. Haney, Beowulf
6. Tolkien, Sir Gwain
7. Machiavelli, Prince
8. Dante, Inferno
9. Aquinas, Shorter Summa
10. Runciman, First Crusade
11. Scott, Talisman
12. More, Utopia
13. Scott, Ivanhoe
14. Chaucer, Canterbury Tales
15. Shakespeare, Taming of Shrew
16. Goethe, Faustus
17. Scott, Great Christian Revolution
18. Calvin, The Golden Booklet
19. Vasari, Lives
20. Shakespeare, Sonnets
21. Westminster Confession
22. Bunyan, Pilgrim’s Progress
23. Chalmers, Parish Life
24. Spurgeon, All of Grace
25. Pascal, Pensees

Modernity:
1. Chesterton, Orthodoxy
2. Van Til, Calvinistic Concept of Culture
3. Scott, Robespierre
4. Austen, Pride and Prejudice
5. Eliot, Silas Marner
6. Scott, Antiquarian
7. Johnson, Birth of the Modern
8. Portable Romantic Poets
9. Conrad, Heart of Darkness
10. Dickens, Hard Times
11. Grant, Big Stick
12. Mansfield, Then Darkness Fled
13. Ferguson, Pity of War
14. Buchan, Greenmantle
15. Fitzgerald, Great Gatsby
16. Belloc, Servile State
17. Steinbeck, Grapes of Wrath
18. Mencken, Crestomathy
19. Mansfield, Never Give In
20. Quiller-Couch, Q and I
21. Tolkien, Lord of the Rings
22. O’Connor, A Good Man Is Hard to Find
23. Hall, Arrogance of Modern
24. Lewis, Experiment in Criticism
25. Wolfe, From Bauhaus to Our House
26. Powers, Dinner at Deviant’s Palace
27. Kunstler, Geography of Nowhere

January Bible Reading

February Bible Reading

March Bible Reading

April Bible Reading

May Bible Reading

June Bible Reading

July Bible Reading

August Bible Reading

September Bible Reading

October Bible Reading

November Bible Reading

December Bible Reading

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