Modern Library's Best Books

Just came across Modern Library's 100 Best Novels and 100 Best Nonfiction, first published in The New York Times on Monday, July 20, 1998, and the Radcliffe's Rival 100 Best Novels List.

I've read few from all three of the lists and wondered what folks think about these "best books" lists.

Of the ones I've read, I agree that some belong on a "best books" list but others I just hated reading.

Any thoughts?

I've pasted the 100 Best Novels and 100 Best Nonfiction below.

Modern Library's 100 Best Novels

1. ULYSSES by James Joyce


2. THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald


3. A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce


4. LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov


5. BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley


6. THE SOUND AND THE FURY by William Faulkner


7. CATCH-22


8. DARKNESS AT NOON by Arthur Koestler


9. SONS AND LOVERS by D.H. Lawrence


10. THE GRAPES OF WRATH by John Steinbeck


11. UNDER THE VOLCANO by Malcolm Lowry


12. THE WAY OF ALL FLESH by Samuel Butler


13. 1984 by George Orwell


14. I, CLAUDIUS by Robert Graves


15. TO THE LIGHTHOUSE by Virginia Woolf


16. AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY by Theodore Dreiser


17. THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER by Carson McCullers


18. SLAUGHTERHOUSE-FIVE by Kurt Vonnegut


19. INVISIBLE MAN by Ralph Ellison


20. NATIVE SON by Richard Wright


21. HENDERSON THE RAIN KING by Saul Bellow


22. APPOINTMENT IN SAMARRA by John O'Hara


23. U.S.A. (trilogy) by John Dos Passos


24. WINESBURG, OHIO by Sherwood Anderson


25. A PASSAGE TO INDIA by E.M. Forster


26. THE WINGS OF THE DOVE by Henry James


27. THE AMBASSADORS by Henry James


28. TENDER IS THE NIGHT by F. Scott Fitzgerald


29. THE STUDS LONIGAN TRILOGY by James T. Farrell


30. THE GOOD SOLDIER by Ford Madox Ford


31. ANIMAL FARM by George Orwell


32. THE GOLDEN BOWL by Henry James


33. SISTER CARRIE by Theodore Dreiser


34. A HANDFUL OF DUST by Evelyn Waugh


35. AS I LAY DYING by William Faulkner


36. ALL THE KING'S MEN by Robert Penn Warren


37. THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY by Thornton Wilder


38. HOWARDS END by E.M. Forster


39. GO TELL IT ON THE MOUNTAIN by James Baldwin


40. THE HEART OF THE MATTER by Graham Greene


41. LORD OF THE FLIES by William Golding


42. DELIVERANCE by James Dickey


43. A DANCE TO THE MUSIC OF TIME (series) by Anthony Powell


44. POINT COUNTER POINT by Aldous Huxley


45. THE SUN ALSO RISES by Ernest Hemingway


46. THE SECRET AGENT by Joseph Conrad


47. NOSTROMO by Joseph Conrad


48. THE RAINBOW by D.H. Lawrence


49. WOMEN IN LOVE by D.H. Lawrence


50. TROPIC OF CANCER by Henry Miller


51. THE NAKED AND THE DEAD by Norman Mailer


52. PORTNOY'S COMPLAINT by Philip Roth


53. PALE FIRE by Vladimir Nabokov


54. LIGHT IN AUGUST by William Faulkner


55. ON THE ROAD by Jack Kerouac


56. THE MALTESE FALCON by Dashiell Hammett


57. PARADE'S END by Ford Madox Ford


58. THE AGE OF INNOCENCE by Edith Wharton


59. ZULEIKA DOBSON by Max Beerbohm


60. THE MOVIEGOER by Walker Percy


61. DEATH COMES FOR THE ARCHBISHOP by Willa Cather


62. FROM HERE TO ETERNITY by James Jones


63. THE WAPSHOT CHRONICLES by John Cheever


64. THE CATCHER IN THE RYE by J.D. Salinger


65. A CLOCKWORK ORANGE by Anthony Burgess


66. OF HUMAN BONDAGE by W. Somerset Maugham


67. HEART OF DARKNESS by Joseph Conrad


68. MAIN STREET by Sinclair Lewis


69. THE HOUSE OF MIRTH by Edith Wharton


70. THE ALEXANDRIA QUARTET by Lawrence Durell


71. A HIGH WIND IN JAMAICA by Richard Hughes


72. A HOUSE FOR MR BISWAS by V.S. Naipaul


73. THE DAY OF THE LOCUST by Nathanael West


74. A FAREWELL TO ARMS by Ernest Hemingway


75. SCOOP by Evelyn Waugh


76. THE PRIME OF MISS JEAN BRODIE by Muriel Spark


77. FINNEGANS WAKE by James Joyce


78. KIM by Rudyard Kipling


79. A ROOM WITH A VIEW by E.M. Forster


80. BRIDESHEAD REVISITED by Evelyn Waugh


81. THE ADVENTURES OF AUGIE MARCH by Saul Bellow


82. ANGLE OF REPOSE by Wallace Stegner


83. A BEND IN THE RIVER by V.S. Naipaul


84. THE DEATH OF THE HEART by Elizabeth Bowen


85. LORD JIM by Joseph Conrad


86. RAGTIME by E.L. Doctorow


87. THE OLD WIVES' TALE by Arnold Bennett


88. THE CALL OF THE WILD by Jack London


89. LOVING by Henry Green


90. MIDNIGHT'S CHILDREN by Salman Rushdie


91. TOBACCO ROAD by Erskine Caldwell


92. IRONWEED by William Kennedy


93. THE MAGUS by John Fowles


94. WIDE SARGASSO SEA by Jean Rhys


95. UNDER THE NET by Iris Murdoch


96. SOPHIE'S CHOICE by William Styron


97. THE SHELTERING SKY by Paul Bowles


98. THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE by James M. Cain


99. THE GINGER MAN by J.P. Donleavy


100. THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS by Booth Tarkington

Modern Library's 100 Best Nonfiction

1. THE EDUCATION OF HENRY ADAMS by Henry Adams


2. THE VARIETIES OF RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE by William James


3. UP FROM SLAVERY by Booker T. Washington


4. A ROOM OF ONE'S OWN by Virginia Woolf


5. SILENT SPRING by Rachel Carson


6. SELECTED ESSAYS, 1917-1932 by T. S. Eliot


7. THE DOUBLE HELIX by James D. Watson


8. SPEAK, MEMORY by Vladimir Nabokov


9. THE AMERICAN LANGUAGE by H. L. Mencken


10. THE GENERAL THEORY OF EMPLOYMENT, INTEREST, AND MONEY by John Maynard Keynes


11. THE LIVES OF A CELL by Lewis Thomas


12. THE FRONTIER IN AMERICAN HISTORY by Frederick Jackson Turner


13. BLACK BOY by Richard Wright


14. ASPECTS OF THE NOVEL by E. M. Forster


15. THE CIVIL WAR by Shelby Foote


16. THE GUNS OF AUGUST by Barbara Tuchman


17. THE PROPER STUDY OF MANKIND by Isaiah Berlin


18. THE NATURE AND DESTINY OF MAN by Reinhold Niebuhr


19. NOTES OF A NATIVE SON by James Baldwin


20. THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ALICE B. TOKLAS by Gertrude Stein


21. THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE by William Strunk and E. B. White


22. AN AMERICAN DILEMMA by Gunnar Myrdal


23. PRINCIPIA MATHEMATICA by Alfred North Whitehead and Bertrand Russell


24. THE MISMEASURE OF MAN by Stephen Jay Gould


25. THE MIRROR AND THE LAMP by Meyer Howard Abrams


26. THE ART OF THE SOLUBLE by Peter B. Medawar


27. THE ANTS by Bert Hoelldobler and Edward O. Wilson


28. A THEORY OF JUSTICE by John Rawls


29. ART AND ILLUSION by Ernest H. Gombrich


30. THE MAKING OF THE ENGLISH WORKING CLASS by E. P. Thompson


31. THE SOULS OF BLACK FOLK by W.E.B. Du Bois


32. PRINCIPIA ETHICA by G. E. Moore


33. PHILOSOPHY AND CIVILIZATION by John Dewey


34. ON GROWTH AND FORM by D'Arcy Thompson


35. IDEAS AND OPINIONS by Albert Einstein


36. THE AGE OF JACKSON, Arthur Schlesinger by Jr.


37. THE MAKING OF THE ATOMIC BOMB by Richard Rhodes


38. BLACK LAMB and Grey Falcon by Rebecca West


39. AUTOBIOGRAPHIES by W. B. Yeats


40. SCIENCE AND CIVILIZATION IN CHINA by Joseph Needham


41. GOODBYE TO ALL THAT by Robert Graves


42. HOMAGE TO CATALONIA by George Orwell


43. THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MARK TWAIN by Mark Twain


44. CHILDREN OF CRISIS by Robert Coles


45. A STUDY OF HISTORY by Arnold J. Toynbee


46. THE AFFLUENT SOCIETY by John Kenneth Galbraith


47. PRESENT AT THE CREATION by Dean Acheson


48. THE GREAT BRIDGE by David McCullough


49. PATRIOTIC GORE by Edmund Wilson


50. SAMUEL JOHNSON by Walter Jackson Bate


51. THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MALCOLM X by Alex Haley and Malcolm X


52. THE RIGHT STUFF by Tom Wolfe


53. EMINENT VICTORIANS by Lytton Strachey


54. WORKING by Studs Terkel


55. DARKNESS VISIBLE by William Styron


56. THE LIBERAL IMAGINATION by Lionel Trilling


57. THE SECOND WORLD WAR by Winston Churchill


58. OUT OF AFRICA by Isak Dinesen


59. JEFFERSON AND HIS TIME by Dumas Malone


60. IN THE AMERICAN GRAIN by William Carlos Williams


61. CADILLAC DESERT by Marc Reisner


62. THE HOUSE OF MORGAN by Ron Chernow


63. THE SWEET SCIENCE by A. J. Liebling


64. THE OPEN SOCIETY AND ITS ENEMIES by Karl Popper


65. THE ART OF MEMORY by Frances A. Yates


66. RELIGION AND THE RISE OF CAPITALISM by R. H. Tawney


67. A PREFACE TO MORALS by Walter Lippmann


68. THE GATE OF HEAVENLY PEACE by Jonathan D. Spence


69. THE STRUCTURE OF SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTIONS by Thomas S. Kuhn


70. THE STRANGE CAREER OF JIM CROW by C. Vann Woodward


71. THE RISE OF THE WEST by William H. McNeill


72. THE GNOSTIC GOSPELS by Elaine Pagels


73. JAMES JOYCE by Richard Ellmann


74. FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE by Cecil Woodham-Smith


75. THE GREAT WAR AND MODERN MEMORY by Paul Fussell


76. THE CITY IN HISTORY by Lewis Mumford


77. BATTLE CRY OF FREEDOM by James M. McPherson


78. WHY WE CAN'T WAIT by Martin Luther King by Jr.


79. THE RISE OF THEODORE ROOSEVELT by Edmund Morris


80. STUDIES IN ICONOLOGY by Erwin Panofsky


81. THE FACE OF BATTLE by John Keegan


82. THE STRANGE DEATH OF LIBERAL ENGLAND by George Dangerfield


83. VERMEER by Lawrence Gowing


84. A BRIGHT SHINING LIE by Neil Sheehan


85. WEST WITH THE NIGHT by Beryl Markham


86. THIS BOY'S LIFE by Tobias Wolff


87. A MATHEMATICIAN'S APOLOGY by G. H. Hardy


88. SIX EASY PIECES by Richard P. Feynman


89. PILGRIM AT TINKER CREEK by Annie Dillard


90. THE GOLDEN BOUGH by James George Frazer


91. SHADOW AND ACT by Ralph Ellison


92. THE POWER BROKER by Robert A. Caro


93. THE AMERICAN POLITICAL TRADITION by Richard Hofstadter


94. THE CONTOURS OF AMERICAN HISTORY by William Appleman Williams


95. THE PROMISE OF AMERICAN LIFE by Herbert Croly


96. IN COLD BLOOD by Truman Capote


97. THE JOURNALIST AND THE MURDERER by Janet Malcolm


98. THE TAMING OF CHANCE by Ian Hacking


99. OPERATING INSTRUCTIONS by Anne Lamott


100. MELBOURNE by Lord David Cecil