About the Author

Daniel S. Burt holds a Ph.D. from New York University and has taught at New York University and Wesleyan University, including courses on the history of the novel and on such figures as Dickens, Tolstoy, and Austen. Dr. Burt has written several books, including The Literary 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Novelists, Playwrights, and Poets of All Time for Facts On File/Checkmark Books. He resides in Middletown, CT.

Reviews

Next to reading fiction, fiction lovers love to rank fiction and debate the relative merits of their favorite works. Thus the popularity of "best books" reference works. One of the latest, but not the least, is The Novel 100. Burt, who has taught university courses in the novel for over 20 years, has authored several other works of literary rankings, such as What Historical Novel Do I Read Next? and The Literary 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Novelists, Playwrights, and Poets of All Time. He identifies a great novel as one that has defined or modified the genre and remained influential over time. All but ten of Burt's top 100 were written in the 19th or 20th centuries, and aside from one representative each from Japanese, Chinese, African, and Arabic literature, all are products of Western civilization (e.g., Cervantes's Don Quixote, Joyce's Ulysses, Camus's The Stranger, and Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms). The chosen titles fit squarely within the academic literary canon, which has grown to encompass writers of varying gender, race, and ethnicity. Entries for each title average about three pages and provide a concise, scholarly, and thought-provoking analysis that puts the work in its historical context and distills its significance for the genre. A plot synopsis is included, but students looking for a simple Cliff Notes-style abstract will be disappointed. Fiction lovers, on the other hand, will be delighted. Chafing under the limitation of a mere 100 titles, Burt concludes his work with "A Second Hundred (Honorable Mentions)" list. His stated goal is to provoke debate over literary values and encourage a deep reading of literature, and he certainly succeeds. Highly recommended for all libraries.-Nadie Cohen-Baker, Univ. of Georgia, Athens Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.