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Timeless Classics

An old Chinese proverb says,

"A book is like a garden in the pocket."

Many of us who have valued reading in our early years derive enjoyment from reading to our children, and now, as I do, to our grandchildren. Books are voyages of discovery and transforming instruments to all of us.

A few years ago, the National Endowment for the Humanities asked schools around the country to send reading lists of their favorite books. Noticing how often books that other generations have enjoyed appear on these lists, we decided to make this compilation of tried-and-true titles. The works herein, published in 1960 or earlier, have delighted generations of readers.

Some have asked, "Is the book dead?" as we move into new computer technologies. Not at all. Print text will co-exist with these new mediums.

As concerned parents, educators, and counselors, we must continue to emphasize the importance of access to good reading in order to shape our students' learning process, enhance their understanding of American heritage, and open up a new world of self-fulfillment. As Aldous Huxley said,

"The proper study of mankind is books."

There are some excellent older books that are missing from the list, because they appeared too infrequently in the school selections: Kate Douglas Wiggin's Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, for example; Dylan Thomas's A Child's Christmas in Wales; Frederick Douglass's Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. Despite the absences, we hope this compilation will nevertheless bring hours of pleasure and enlightenment.

The titles presented for suggested extracurricular reading provide a solid foundation and hours of enjoyment for students and scholars of all ages.

We at NEH hope that the "Timeless Classics" booklist will continue to be a rich source of material for everyone.

Sheldon Hackney
Chairman

"Books are humanity in print" ...Barbara Tuchman

"Literature is an investment of genius which pays dividends to all subsequent times." ...John Burroughs

"All that mankind has done, thought, gained, or been: it is lying as in magic preservation in the pages of books."
...Thomas Carlyle

Kindergarten through Grade 6
AUTHORTITLE
Adamson, JoyBorn Free
AesopFables
Alcott, Louisa MayLittle Women
Andersen, Hans ChristianFairy tales
Atwater, Richard and FlorenceMr. Popper's Penguins
Bailey, Carolyn SherwinMiss Hickory
Barrie, J.M.Peter Pan
Baum, L. Frank The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
Bemelmans, LudwigMadeline series
Bond, MichaelA Bear Called Paddington
Boston, L.M.The Children of Green Knowe
Brink, Carol RyrieCaddie Woodlawn
Brown, Margaret WiseGoodnight, Moon
Brunhoff, Jean deThe Story of Babar
Burnett, Frances HodgsonThe Secret Garden
Burton, Virginia LeeMike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel
Butterworth, OliverThe Enormous Egg
Clark, Ann NolanSecret of the Andes
Cleary, BeverlyHenry Huggins series
Coatsworth, ElizabethThe Cat Who Went to Heaven
Dalgliesh, AliceThe Bears on Hemlock Mountain
The Courage of Sarah Noble
De Angeli, MargueriteThe Door in the Wall
De Jong, MeindertThe House of Sixty Fathers
The Wheel on the School
Dodge, Mary MapesHans Brinker, or the Silver Skates
Du Bois, William PeneThe Twenty-One Balloons
Edmonds, Walter D.The Matchlock Gun
Estes, EleanorGinger Pye
Moffats series
Farley, Walter The Black Stallion
Field, RachelHitty, Her First Hundred Years
Fritz, JeanThe Cabin Faced West
Gilbreth, Frank B. and Ernestine G. CareyCheaper By the Dozen
Gipson, FredOld Yeller
Godden, RumerThe Mousewife
Grahame, KennethThe Reluctant Dragon
The Wind in the Willows
Gray, Elizabeth JanetAdam of the Road
Grimm, Jacob and WilhelmGrimm's Fairy Tales
Hawes, CharlesThe Dark Frigate
Haywood, CarolynBetsy series
Henry, MargueriteKing of the Wind
Misty of Chincoteague
Keith, HaroldRifles for Watie
Kelly, EricThe Trumpeter of Krakow
Kipling, RudyardCaptains Courageous
Just So Stories for Little Children
The Jungle Books
Kjelgaard, JimBig Red
Knight, EricLassie Come Home
Krumgold, Joseph...and Now Miguel
Onion John
LaFarge, OliverLaughing Boy
Lamb, Charles and MaryTales from Shakespear
Latham, Jean LeeCarry on, Mr. Bowditch
Lawson, RobertBen & Me
Rabbit Hill
Leaf, MunroThe Story of Ferdinand
Lear, EdwardBook of Nonsense
Lenski, LoisStrawberry Girl
Lewis, C.S.Chronicles of Narnia series
Lindgren, AstridPippi Longstocking series
Lofting, HughDoctor Doolittle series
London, JackThe Call of the Wild
White Fang
MacDonald, BettyMrs. Piggle-Wiggle
MacGregor, EllenMiss Pickerell series
McCloskey, RobertBlueberries for Sal
Homer Price
Make Way for Ducklings
McSwigan, MarieSnow Treasure
Meigs, CorneliaInvincible Louisa
Milne, A.A.The House at Pooh Corner
Now We Are Six
When We Were Very Young
Winnie-the-Pooh
Minarik, Else HolmelundLittle Bear
Montgomery, L.M.Anne of Green Gables
Mukerji, Dhan GhopalGay-Neck, the Story of a Pigeon
Norton, MaryThe Borrowers series
O'Hara, MaryMy Friend Flicka
Pearce, PhilippaTom's Midnight Garden
Perrault, CharlesCinderella
Potter, BeatrixThe Tale of Peter Rabbit
Pyle, HowardThe Merry Adventures of Robin Hood
Rey, H.A.Curious George series
Richter, ConradThe Light in the Forest
Selden, George The Cricket in Times Square
Seuss, Dr.The Cat in the Hat
Sewell, AnnaBlack Beauty
Sorenson, VirginiaMiracles on Maple Hill
Speare, Elizabeth GeorgeThe Witch of Blackbird Pond
Sperry, ArmstrongCall It Courage
Spyri, JohannaHeidi
Steinbeck, JohnThe Red Pony
Stevenson, Robert LouisA Child's Garden of Verses
Kidnapped
Treasure Island
Travers, Pamela L.Mary Poppins series
Van Loon, HendrikThe Story of Mankind
White, E.B.Charlotte's Web
Stuart Little
Wilder, Laura IngallsLittle House series
Williams, MargeryThe Velveteen Rabbit
Wyss, JohannSwiss Family Robinson
Zion, GeneHarry the Dirty Dog

ditzel

Grades 7 and 8
Alcott, Louisa MayLittle Men
Bagnold, EnidNational Velvet
Blackmore, Richard D.Lorna Doone
Boulle, PierreThe Bridge over the River Kwai
Bradbury, RayDandelion Wine
Fahrenheit 451
The Illustrated Man
Martian Chronicles
Buchan, JohnThe Thirty-Nine Steps
Bunyan, JohnThe Pilgrim's Progress
Carroll, LewisAlice's Adventures in Wonderland
Through the Looking Glass
Clark, WalterThe Ox-Bow Incident
Cooper, James FenimoreThe Deerslayer
The Last of the Mohicans
Curie, EveMadame Curie: A Biography
Dana, Richard HenryTwo Years before the Mast
Day, ClarenceLife with Father
Defoe, DanielRobinson Crusoe
Dickens, CharlesA Christmas Carol
Douglas, Lloyd C.The Robe
Doyle, Arthur ConanAdventures of Sherlock Holmes
Dumas, AlexanderThe Count of Monte Christo
The Three Musketeers
Du Maurier, DaphneRebecca
Edmonds, Walter D.Drums along the Mohawk
Ferber, EdnaCimarron
Forbes, EstherJohnny Tremain
Forester, C.S.The African Queen
The Hornblower series
Frank, AnneDiary of a Young Girl
Frost, RobertPoems
Gallico, PaulThe Snow Goose
Gunther, JohnDeath Be Not Proud
Guthrie, A.B.The Big Sky
Haggard, H. RiderKing Solomon's Mines
Hansberry, LorraineRaisin in the Sun
Hemingway, ErnestThe Old Man and the Sea
Hersey, John A Bell for Adano
Hiroshima
The Wall
Heyerdahl, ThorKon-Tiki
Hilton, JamesGoodbye, Mr. Chips
Lost Horizon
Hudson, W.H.Green Mansions
Hughes, RichardA High Wind in Jamaica
Hugo, VictorThe Hunchback of Notre Dame
Irving, WashingtonThe Legend of Sleepy Hollow
Keller, HelenStory of My Life
Kennedy, John F.Profiles in Courage
Kipling, RudyardKim
Knowles, JohnA Separate Peace
Lee, HarperTo Kill a Mockingbird
London, JackThe Sea Wolf
Lord, WalterA Night to Remember
Malory, Sir ThomasLe Morte d'Arthur
Maxwell, Gavin Ring of Bright Water
McCullers, CarsonMember of the Wedding
Michener, JamesThe Bridges at Toko-Ri
Mitchell, MargaretGone with the Wind
Nordhoff, Charles and J.N. HallMutiny on the Bounty
O'Dell, ScottIsland of the Blue Dolphins
Orczy, Baroness EmmaThe Scarlet Pimpernel
Paton, AlanCry, the Beloved Country
Pyle, HowardMen of Iron
Rawlings, Marjorie KinnanThe Yearling
Renault, MaryThe King Must Die
Roberts, KennethNorthwest Passage
Saint-Exupery, Antoine deThe Little Prince
Wind, Sand and Stars
SakiStories
Schaefer, JackShane
Scott, Sir WalterIvanhoe
Shelley, MaryFrankenstein
Smith, BettyA Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Steinbeck, JohnThe Pearl
Tortilla Flat
Stevenson, Robert LouisThe Black Arrow
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Stoker, BramDracula
Thurber, JamesThe Thurber Carnival
Tolkien, J.R.R.The Hobbit
The Lord of the Rings
Twain, MarkThe Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court
Innocents Abroad
Life on the Mississippi
The Prince and the Pauper
Verne, JulesAround the World in Eighty Days
Journey to the Center of the Earth
Mysterious Island
20,000 Leagues under the Sea
Wallace, LewisBen-Hur
Washington, Booker T.Up from Slavery
Wells, H.G.The Time Machine
War of the Worlds
Wharton, EdithEthan Frome
Wilder, ThorntonThe Bridge of San Luis Rey
Wister, OwenThe Virginian
Yates, ElizabethAmos Fortune, Free Man

ditzel

Grades 9 through 12
Agee, JamesA Death in the Family
Anderson, SherwoodWinesburg, Ohio
Austen, JaneEmma
Northanger Abbey
Pride and Prejudice
Sense and Sensibility
Baldwin, JamesGo Tell It on the Mountain
Balzac, Honore dePere Goriot
Beckett, SamuelWaiting for Godot
The BibleOld Testament
New Testament
Bolt, RobertA Man for All Seasons
Bronte, CharlotteJane Eyre
Bronte, EmilyWuthering Heights
Browning, RobertPoems
Buck, PearlThe Good Earth
Butler, SamuelThe Way of All Flesh
Camus, AlbertThe Plague
The Stranger
Cather, WillaDeath Comes for the Archbishop
My Antonia
Cervantes, MiguelDon Quixote
Chaucer, GeoffreyThe Canterbury Tales
Chekhov, AntonThe Cherry Orchard
Chopin, KateThe Awakening
Collins, WilkieThe Moonstone
Conrad, JosephHeart of Darkness
Lord Jim
The Secret Sharer
Victory
Crane, Stephen The Red Badge of Courage
DanteThe Divine Comedy
Defoe, DanielMoll Flanders
Dickens, CharlesBleak House
David Copperfield
Great Expectations
Hard Times
Oliver Twist
A Tale of Two Cities
Dickinson, EmilyPoems
Dinesen, Isak Out of Africa
Dostoevski, FyodorBrothers Karamazov
Crime and Punishment
Dreiser, TheodoreAn American Tragedy
Sister Carrie
Eliot, GeorgeAdam Bede
Middlemarch
Mill on the Floss
Silas Marner
Eliot, T.S.Murder in the Cathedral
Ellison, RalphInvisible Man
Emerson, Ralph WaldoEssays
Faulkner, WilliamAbsalom, Absalom!
As I Lay Dying
Intruder in the Dust
Light in August
The Sound and the Fury
Fielding, HenryJoseph Andrews
Tom Jones
Fitzgerald, F. ScottThe Great Gatsby
Tender Is the Night
Flaubert, GustaveMadame Bovary
Forster, E.M.A Passage to India
A Room with a View
Franklin, BenjaminThe Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
Galsworthy, JohnThe Forsyte Saga
Golding, WilliamLord of the Flies
Goldsmith, OliverShe Stoops to Conquer
Graves, RobertI, Claudius
Greene, Graham The Heart of the Matter
The Power and the Glory
Hamilton, EdithMythology
Hardy, ThomasFar From the Madding Crowd
Jude the Obscure
The Mayor of Casterbridge
The Return of the Native
Tess of the D'Urbervilles
Hawthorne, NathanielThe House of the Seven Gables
The Scarlet Letter
Hemingway, ErnestA Farewell to Arms
For Whom the Bell Tolls
The Sun Also Rises
Henry, O.Stories
Hersey, JohnA Single Pebble
Hesse, HermannDemian
Siddhartha
Steppenwolf
HomerThe Iliad
The Odyssey
Hughes, LangstonPoems
Hugo, VictorLes Miserables
Huxley, AldousBrave New World
Ibsen, HenrikA Doll's House
An Enemy of the People
Ghosts
Hedda Gabler
The Master Builder
The Wild Duck
James, HenryThe American
Daisy Miller
Portrait of a Lady
The Turn of the Screw
Joyce, JamesPortrait of the Artist As a Young Man
Dubliners
Kafka, FranzThe Castle
Metamorphosis
The Trial
Keats, JohnPoems
Kerouac, JackOn the Road
Koestler, ArthurDarkness at Noon
Lawrence, D.H.Sons and Lovers
Lawrence, Jerome and Robert E. LeeInherit the Wind
Lewis, SinclairArrowsmith
Babbitt
Main Street
Llewellyn, RichardHow Green Was My Valley
MachiavelliThe Prince
MacLeish, ArchibaldJ.B.
Mann, ThomasBuddenbrooks
The Magic Mountain
Marlowe, ChristopherDr. Faustus
Maugham, SomersetOf Human Bondage
McCullers, CarsonThe Heart Is a Lonely Hunter
Melville, HermanBilly Budd
Moby-Dick
Typee
Miller, Arthur The Crucible
Death of a Salesman
Monsarrat, NicholasThe Cruel Sea
O'Neill, EugeneThe Emperor Jones
A Long Day's Journey into Night
Mourning Becomes Electra
Orwell, George Animal Farm
1984
Pasternak, BorisDoctor Zhivago
Poe, Edgar AllanShort stories
Remarque, ErichAll Quiet on the Western Front
Rolvaag, O.E.Giants in the Earth
Rostand, EdmondCyrano de Bergerac
Salinger, J.D.The Catcher in the Rye
Sandburg, Carl Abraham Lincoln: The Prairie Years
Abraham Lincoln: The War Years
Saroyan, WilliamThe Human Comedy
Sayers, DorothyThe Nine Tailors
Shakespeare, WilliamPlays and sonnets
Shaw, George BernardArms and the Man
Major Barbara
Pygmalion
Saint Joan
Sheridan, Richard B.The School for Scandal
Shute, NevilOn the Beach
Sinclair, UptonThe Jungle
SophoclesAntigone
Oedipus Rex
Steinbeck, JohnEast of Eden
The Grapes of Wrath
Of Mice and Men
Stowe, Harriet BeecherUncle Tom's Cabin
Swift, JonathanGulliver's Travels
Thackeray, William M.Vanity Fair
Thoreau, Henry DavidWalden
Tolstoy, LeoAnna Karenina
War and Peace
Trollope, AnthonyBarchester Towers
Turgenev, IvanFathers and Sons
Twain, MarkPudd'nhead Wilson
Updike, JohnRabbit Run
Virgil The Aeneid
VoltaireCandide
Warren, Robert PennAll the King's Men
Waugh, EvelynBrideshead Revisited
A Handful of Dust
Wharton, EdithAge of Innocence
White, T.H.The Once and Future King
The Sword in the Stone
Wilde, OscarThe Importance of Being Earnest
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Wilder, ThorntonOur Town
Williams, TennesseeThe Glass Menagerie
A Streetcar Named Desire
Wolfe, ThomasLook Homeward, Angel
Woolf, VirginiaMrs. Dalloway
To the Lighthouse
Wouk, HermanThe Caine Mutiny
Wright, RichardBlack Boy
Native Son
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