Home Library and Top 100 Essential Texts

Greetings, friends! There's been plenty of talk going around highlighting the worst of human nature. I'd like to focus on an equally valid perspective that reveals a much fuller picture of what humans are capable of, which is the rich catalogue of knowledge and humanity stored in some of our most beloved (and lesser known) tomes.
If you're anything like me, you will never quite get used to the idea of a kindle or nook. You might have shelves scattered throughout your home or a whole room dedicated to study. I have collected/shared/borrowed and given away more books than I can remember and find an inherent value in a thought-provoking text, regardless of its condition.
I have been throwing around the idea of a thread compiling the 100 most influential/important texts of all time (impossible I know but why not try?) for some time now. In this thread I hope to, with your help and guidance, establish a guide of 100 texts which contain some of the greatest value or wisdom compiled by man.
So, friends, do you have any titles to suggest for our list? Which text/texts have contributed the most to mankind? Which are essential to complete a comprehensive home library?
Here are a few that I would have to add to my own personal list:
1. The Epic of Gilgemesh
2. The Holy Bible
3. Divine Comedy
4. Rumi
5. Poetry of Ranier Maria Rilke
6. I Ching
7. Moby Dick
8. The Complete Works of John Milton
9. The United States Constitution, Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights
10. Rights of Man
11. On the Origin of Species
12. The Brothers Karamozov
13. Dialogues of Plato
14. Ficciones Jorge Luis Borges
15. Hippocratic Corpus
16. Thucydides History of the Peloponnesian War

I had better stop there, or there will be no room for suggestions! So, dear literary minds of ATS, which books do you deem the most essential for humanity? Which of mine would you leave off the list (lol- I can foresee The Bible coming up for discussion) Can you help me round out the list a little bit? And, most importantly, HAVE FUN and celebrate MANKIND!

a reply to: zosimov

Tolkien

a reply to: zosimov
How could you forget Shakespeare?
I also recommend Arnold Toynbee;Studyof History

Sir James Frazer; The Golden Bough
P.G. Wodehouse; The Mr. Mulliner Omnibus (on the principle that if only one volume is allowed, it had better be a large one)

Excellent suggestions, thank you both!!

I would absolutely add these to our compilation.

(Disreali-- yes to Shakespeare facepalm )

a reply to: zosimov

George Orwell 1984. Should be a required read

a reply to: zosimov

I'm what you would call a "pseudo-bookworm-hoarder".

I have entire shelves of brand new books I haven't even opened to a page yet. I'd say close to 100 books, from all different genres. I went through a phase a while ago where I would buy a book almost daily, and pretend like I was going to read it. But.. 100 books later and I'm still pretending.

The good news though, books are timeless and I'm sure one day when I'm old and wrinkly, and probably retired, I'll have time to read them all. I would love to pass them down to my children too.


Thanks for the list, I'm going to have to add some more to my collection.

a reply to: FauxMulder

Yes, I absolutely agree! Thank you for the excellent addition!

1. Oxford English Dictionary

2. Roget's Thesaurus.

3. The Chicago Manual of Style

4. A comprehensive grammar book

5. The latest, comprehensive world atlas

Bonus - I also have a current atlas of world history.

a reply to: knowledgehunter0986

Too funny Hunter, I also have so many books I have never opened (although a great deal of mine come from Goodwill lol). I call them "reference books" Ha.

Have a great one!

a reply to: Lurker1

Great suggestions! I might recommend The Grammar Book by Marianne Celce-Murcia and Diane Larsen-Freeman as your grammar reference.

YES to the OED

In my top 100 essential texts would be Orwell's Animal Farm.

A brilliant political satire for adults and a great story for kids.

a reply to: zosimov

Wanna hear something even more funny? During that phase, the only book I actually did read was the entire Twilight series

..don't judge me, I was young and easily pressured by my women friends.

#TeamEdward

originally posted by: zosimov
a reply to: Lurker1

Great suggestions! I might recommend The Grammar Book by Larsen-Freeman as your grammar reference.

YES to the OED

I only buy reference books. Only rarely do I buy books, and then only if I really, really enjoy it.

Except for the wait time on new books, I absolutely love the library. When I pick up something I've ordered I feel like it's Christmas and Santa brought me presents.

a reply to: knowledgehunter0986

Okay that actually made me laugh out loud. And no judgement, truly. Kudos to anyone who can laught at him/herself.

a reply to: CJCrawley

Great suggestion and one of the most chilling endings I can think of.

a reply to: zosimov

The complete works of Flann O'Brien (Brian O'Nolan).

Not sure about all Colin Wilson but I'd include a core of The Outsider, Mysteries, The Occult, Criminal History of Mankind and Written in Blood.

a reply to: Tulpa

Excellent, thank you!

a reply to: zosimov

Wow! Some of my all-time favorites you mentioned (Brothers Karamazov, Divine Comedy, Paradise Lost, Constitution & Declaration of Independence)

Thanks so much for putting this together!! Celebrate Mankind - great mantra

Perhaps a few others might be great to have:

Emerald Tablets of Thoth
Meditations written by Marcus Aurelius
Civil Disobedience (this is an Essay, but still a great piece of literature)
The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli
Art of War by Sun Tzu
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

a reply to: FamCore

Too funny, I was just looking Walden on my shelf and wondering if it needed to be included.. but so long as we have some Thoreau, we should be good.

to sharing a love of great literature!

Thanks for adding to our list FamCore