A great book is a masterwork whose depth and significance direct us
toward fundamental realities of the world and the human condition. Such
books speak to us everywhere and always, challenging us from their
various perspectives to reflect intelligently on our own situation. The
following list is by no means a complete list of great books, much less
a list of every book worth reading. Neither is it the complete reading
list for all Honors Program courses. It is a list of books that have
been included in the Honors Program; some we read completely, others in
part.
The Bible
The Koran
Achebe:
Things Fall ApartAeschylus:
Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, The EumenidesAl-Ghazali:
Deliverance from ErrorAquinas:
Summa TheologicaAristophanes:
CloudsAristotle:
Nicomachean Ethics, Physics, Poetics, RhetoricAugustine:
ConfessionsAusten:
Pride and PrejudiceBoethius:
Consolation of PhilosophyChaucer:
Canterbury TalesChuang Tzu:
Inner ChaptersConfucius:
AnalectsDante:
Divine ComedyDescartes:
Discourse on Method, MeditationsDostoyevsky:
The Brothers Karamazov, Crime and Punishment, Notes from UndergroundDouglass:
Narrative of the Life of Frederick DouglassDuBois:
Souls of Black FolkEliot:
Four QuartetsEllison:
Invisible ManEmerson:
EssaysEuclid:
ElementsEuripides:
Medea, The BacchaeHamilton, Madison, Jay:
The Federalist PapersFreud:
Leonardo Da Vinci, Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis, Future of an IllusionGalileo:
Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina, Two New SciencesHeidegger:
The Question Concerning Technology, The Age of the World PictureHerodotus:
HistoryHobbes:
LeviathanHomer:
Iliad, OdysseyHume:
Dialogues Concerning Natural ReligionJoyce:
Portrait of the Artist as a Young ManKant:
Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of MoralsKierkegaard:
Philosophical FragmentsKing:
Letter from Birmingham JailLao Tzu:
Tao Te ChingLeopold:
Sand County AlmanacLocke:
Second Treatise of GovernmentLucretius:
De Rerum NaturaLuther:
On Christian LibertyMachiavelli:
The PrinceMalcolm X:
Autobiography of Malcolm XMarx & Engels:
Communist ManifestoMilton:
Paradise LostMelville:
Billy BuddMorrison:
BelovedNietzsche:
Birth of Tragedy, Thus Spake Zarathustra, Beyond Good and EvilPascal:
PenseesPlato:
Alcibiades, Meno, Euthyphro, Symposium, Republic, Apology, Crito, Phaedo, Phaedrus, Ion, Sophist, GorgiasPolybius:
HistoriesPlutarch:
Parallel LivesRousseau:
Social Contract, Discourse on the Origin of InequalityRumi: selected poems
Shakespeare:
Richard II, Henry IV Part 1, Henry IV Part 2, Henry V, King Lear, Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello, Much Ado About Nothing, Tempest,
Merchant of VeniceShelley:
FrankensteinSmith:
Wealth of Nations, Theory of Moral SentimentsSophocles:
Oedipus the King, Antigone, Oedipus at ColonusThoreau:
Walden, Resistance to Civil GovernmentThucydides:
History of the Peloponnesian WarTolstoy:
Death of Ivan Ilych, War and PeaceTocqueville:
The Old Regime and the French RevolutionTwain:
Huckleberry FinnVasari:
Lives of the ArtistsVirgil:
AeneidVoltaire:
CandideVyasa:
Bhagavad-GitaWhitehead:
Science and the Modern WorldWoolf:
A Room of One's Own, To the Lighthouse