Something almost eternal about literature keeps echoing across generations, cultures, and geographies. Herein, therefore, are 15 of the most brilliant works of novels ever written, celebrated for their deep influence on both readers and the world of literature alike.
Some novels have, since time immemorial, left their indelible marks on the annals of literature, impacting generations with their priceless themes, multi-dimensional characters, and reflections on life. Just a couple of numerous examples are the following monumental works, which are revered not only for their mastery of storytelling but also for their longevity across time.
Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace is one of the most important works of world literature ever written, a huge novel involving several families during the Napoleonic invasion of Russia.
Herman Melville's Moby-Dick is a novel of obsession and revenge. The book relates the irrational pursuit of the great white whale, Moby Dick, by the whaling ship captain Ahab.
Pride and Prejudice is a cornerstone of English literature while being a brilliant commentary on the social mores and romantic entanglements of the early 19th century.
The features in the book engage the reader with the context of surveillance, censorship, and eventual loss of freedom in ways that make it a read so pointedly topical even today.
It is a novel set in the decade of jazz and flappers, detailing an account of the tragic story of Jay Gatsby, a man who seeks material wealth and love within an age described by incredible decadence and moral decay.
Following the Buendía family in the fictional town of Macondo, over generations, the novel stitches reality and fantasy into an inimitable tapestry that speaks to love, power, and fate.
The novel, a rewriting of Homer's Odyssey into a single day in Dublin, remarkably renders in detail the minutiae of the human mind with a stream-of-consciousness approach.
Narrated through the eyes of a young girl named Scout Finch, the novel expounds on such issues as morality, empathy, and loss of innocence, continuing to make the novel a touching classic.
Fyodor Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment delves into the mind of a young man, Raskolnikov, who thinks he is above the law and commits murder.
The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger, has finally obtained the classic status by the eternal image it projects in depicting the tangles of teenage angst and rebellion.
It represents one of the endless times of an idealistic knight-errant and his loyal squire, Sancho Panza, offering a constant struggle between real life and illusion with a lot of humour, adventure, and reflections on deep psychology.
A work of Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov is an in-depth philosophical novel going into belief and scepticism, good and evil, through the lives of the Karamazov family.
It has been labelled a landmark of realism because of the precision of its prose and the ruthlessness with which Flaubert perceived the tragic failings of his heroine.
Wuthering Heights is the dark and passionate tale by Emily Brontë of love, revenge, and the supernatural set upon the bleak moors of England.
An in-depth analysis of the worlds of love, society, and morality in 19th-century Russia. The lives of several characters are interwoven within this novel, wherein the tragic affair of Anna serves as the main story.
Each of these fifteen novels is a masterpiece, yet all of them together offer a unique view of the human experience in their manner. Be one an avid reader or just beginning one's odyssey into reading, such works form the cornerstone for any understanding of the power and beauty of the written word.
