1001 books you must read before you die

Peter Boxall (ed). ABC Books, 2006.
Cover design: Quintet Publishing

It’s the title that’s the problem. Weighing in at a shade under 1000 pages, this thumping tome aims to tell you about all the books (meaning novels) that, let’s face it, nobody ever gets around to. Moby Dick, War and Peace, Finnegans Wake – who has the time? Even if you started now, you’d be committed to reading around 200 million words of fiction. You don’t have enough eyes! The selectors of these 1001 books are academics in the main, and this means there is little room for the oddball, the unconventional, the unliterary and the comic. There aren’t many Australian writers here, either, only four. There are numerous obscure choices: good luck getting hold of Kokoro by Natsume Soseki, or Hebdomeros by Giorgio de Chirico, or Cane by Jean Toomer. There’s also a certain amount of pretentiousness in the more recent selections. Whilst the novels before 1950 have generally earned their place, at times I was reminded of Woody Allen’s reply when asked what he would do differently if he had his time over: “I wouldn’t read Beowulf”. The short summaries of why the books are ‘must-reads’ range from enjoyably enthusiastic to boringly egocentric.
- John