The 1,777 Works on the Really Long List
So the nearly one thousand books on the Greatest Literature of All Time list were not enough for you?
You may have several reasons to appreciate a longer list. A wider selection presents more great works you've never heard of. It helps you further explore eras or genres of writing you become interested in. It encourages diversity by straying from the established canon. It offers you more choices to create a reading list for personal or educational purposes.
Like the Greatest Literature list, this one focuses on major works, leaving short poems and stories mostly to their own lists, although a few significant short works have been included here.
This list is a work in progress. As with all other lists, we'll be updating and upgrading it continually.
It is, however, already so long we have to break it into seven separate pages, as you can see below.
Latest update: July 26, 2022
The really long list of great literature
Ancient | Medieval | Renaissance | 18th-century | 19th-century | 20th-century | 21st-century
Ancient Literature (to 400 CE)
c.2100–2100 BCE
The Descent of Inanna
Anonymous
Sumer
Poetry
c.2100–1200 BCE
Babylon
Epic poem
c.1200 BCE
Tale of Two Brothers
Anonymous
Egypt
Story
c.1200–100 BCE
The Hebrew Bible
Various
Israel
Prose, poetry
c.1100 BCE
Story of Wenamun
Anonymous
Egypt
Story
c.1000–600 BCE
Classic of Poetry
Various
China
Poetry
c.750 BCE
Greece
Epic poem
c.700 BCE
Greece
Epic poem
c.600 BCE–200 CE
Ramayana
Valmiki
India
Epic poem
c.610–580 BCE
Sappho's Poems
Sappho
Greece
Poetry collection
c.600–500 BCE
Fables
Aesop
Greece
Story collection
c.520–440 BCE
Epinician Odes
Pindar
Greece
Poetry collection
475 BCE
Olympian
Pindar
Greece
Play
472 BCE
The Persians
Aeschylus
Greece
Play
467 BCE
Seven Against Thebes
Aeschylus
Greece
Play
c.462 BCE
The Suppliant Maidens
Aeschylus
Greece
Play
458 BCE
The Oresteia
Aeschylus
Greece
Play trilogy
c.450–425 BCE
Prometheus Bound
Aeschylus
Greece
Play
442–441 BCE
Ajax
Sophocles
Greece
Play
438 BCE
Alcestis
Euripides
Greece
Play
431 BCE
Medea
Euripides
Greece
Play
429 BCE
Sophocles
Greece
Play
428 BCE
Hippolytus
Euripides
Greece
Play
Andromache
Euripides
Greece
Play
425 BCE
The Acharnians
Aristophanes
Greece
Play
424 BCE
The Knights
Aristophanes
Greece
Play
423 BCE
The Clouds
Aristophanes
Greece
Play
The Suppliants
Euripides
Greece
Play
422 BCE
The Wasps
Aristophanes
Greece
Play
c.420–410 BCE
Electra
Sophocles
Greece
Play
418 BCE
Electra
Euripides
Greece
Play
c.416 BCE
Herakles
Euripides
Greece
Play
415 BCE
The Trojan Women
Euripides
Greece
Play
414 BCE
The Birds
Aristophanes
Greece
Play
411 BCE
Women at the Thesmophoria
Aristophanes
Greece
Play
412 BCE
Helen
Euripides
Greece
Play
411 BCE
Lysistrata
Aristophanes
Greece
Play
409 BCE
Philoctetes
Sophocles
Greece
Play
406 BCE
The Bacchae
Euripides
Greece
Play
405 BCE
The Frogs
Aristophanes
Greece
Play
401 BCE
Oedipus at Colonus
Sophocles
Greece
Play
c.400 BCE–400CE
Mahābhārata
Anonymous
India
Epic poem
c.385–370 BCE
The Symposium
Plato
Greece
Dialogue
c.380 BCE
Plato
Greece
Dialogue
c.380 BCE
Meno
Plato
Greece
Dialogue
c.370 BCE
Anabis
Xenophon
Greece
Poetry
Cryopedia
Xenophon
Greece
Biography
316–317 BCE
Dyskolos
Menander
Greece
Play
c.300 BCE
Zhuangzi
Zhuang Zhou
China
Story collection
c.270 BCE
Epigrams
Asclepiades of Samos
Greece
Poetry collection
Idylls
Theocritus
Greece
Poetry collection
c.250 BCE
Voyage of the Argonauts
Appollonius of Rhodes
Greece
Epic poetry
c.200–300 BCE
Panchatantra (Five Treatises)
Anonymous
India
Story collection
c.200 BCE
The Twin Brothers
Plautus
Rome
Play
Miles Gloriosus
Plautus
Rome
Play
191 BCE
Pseudolus
Plautus
Rome
Play
166 BCE
The Girl from Andros
Terence
Rome
Play
163 BCE
The Self-Tormenter
Terence
Rome
Play
161 BCE
Eunuchus
Terence
Rome
Play
c.50 BCE
On the Nature of Things
Lucretius
Rome
Poetry
c.41–37 BCE
Eclogues
Virgil
Rome
Poetry collection
c.35–30 BCE
Satires
Horace
Rome
Poetry collection
30–26 BCE
Marathus cycle
Tibullus
Rome
Poetry
29 BCE
Georgics
Virgil
Rome
Poem
c.29–16 BCE
Elegies
Sextus Propertius
Rome
Poetry collection
c.29–19 BCE
Aeneid
Virgil
Rome
Epic poem
23–13 BCE
Odes
Horace
Rome
Poetry collection
c.10 BCE
The Art of Love
Rome
Poem
c.50 CE
Media
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
Rome
Play
Hercules Furens
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
Rome
Play
c.54 CE
Phaedra
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
Rome
Play
c.55 CE
Thyestes
Lucius Annaeus Seneca
Rome
Play
c.60-70 CE
Satyricon
Gaius Petronius Arbiter
Rome
Prose, poetry
61–65 CE
Pharsalia
Lucan
Rome
Poetry
c.65–100 CE
The New Testament
Various
Middle East
Prose, poetry
c.86–103 CE
Epigrams
Martial
Rome
Poetry collection
c.100 CE
Parallel Lives
Plutarch
Greece
Biographies
c.100–127 CE
Satires
Juvenal
Rome
Poetry collection
c.150 CE
The Golden Ass
Lucius Apuleius
Rome
Prose
c.290 CE
Records of Diverse Matters
Zhang Hua
China
Story collection
c.300 CE
The Vision of Vasavadatta
Bhāsa
India
Play
397–400
Confessions
Augustine of Hippo
Algeria
Memoir
c.400 CE
The Recognition of Sakuntala
Kalidasa
India
Play
Ancient | Medieval | Renaissance | 18th-century | 19th-century | 20th-century | 21st-century
