35 Books That Have Made History

How many of these 35 books that have made history have you read?

Why I took the Course, Books That Have Made History

When was the last time you did something out of the ordinary? Do the people around you consider you to be predictable? I would like to think that I am unpredictable – in a predictable way. I would like to think that I do interesting things.

Anyway, a few years ago, I decided to work on a non-degree liberal arts education. The plan was to take free online courses. For the most part, I did just that, except for Books That Have Made History: Books That Can Change Your Life.

Continuous learning is a part of life. If you’re not a reader, you can find a synopsis of many books from Readitforme that you can listen to. Click the link to join. This is a great way to learn the latest thinking on many topics. And it is a great way to learn which books to buy and devour.

I bought this course from the Great Courses because I’m interested in classic literature. Although the course is rated only 3.9 out of five, I really enjoyed the content of each lecture. The one thing I didn’t like is the instructor standing around, not moving too much. He looked wooden, and that got boring really fast. I would have preferred looking at slides. I think we love PowerPoint presentations too much. By the way, this post is repurposed (Getting an Education from Books).

 Beowulf The Bacchae of Euripides The Analects The Prince

Have you read?

The Bacchae of Euripides, a Book Review

Beowulf, Book Review #theclassics

Walden by Henry David Thoreau, Review #theclassics

All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque #theclassics

The Analects of Confucius, Review

The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli, Book Review

The late Dr. J. Rufus Fears, covered 35 books in 36, 30-minute lectures. A few years ago, during 18 days, I worked my way through all the lectures. Two every day, first thing in the morning. I've been slowly working my way through these books that have made history.

I think I have read about half of them by now. Take a peek and let me know how many you have read. The books on the list are not the kind of books that the typical person would read. And that’s the point. These books will give your mind an intellectual workout.

If you need help and would like a program that’s already set-up to help you read more books, Join MoreReads: Blueprint to Change the World, click the link to buy.

35 Books That Have Made History: Books That Can Change Your Life

1. Letters and Papers from Prison
2. The Iliad, Iliad
3. Meditations, Marcus Aurelius
4. Bhagavad Gita: A New Translation
5. Book of Exodus
6. Gospel of Mark
7. Koran
8. Gilgamesh: A New English Version
9. Beowulf: A New Verse Translation (Bilingual Edition)
10. Book of Job
11. Oresteia, Aeschylus
12. Bacchae, Euripides,
13. Phaedo (Oxford World’s Classics), Plato
14. The Divine Comedy (The Inferno, The Purgatorio, and The Paradiso), Dante
15. Othello The Moor of Venice, Shakespeare
16. Prometheus Bound (Greek Tragedy in New Translations), Aeschylus
17. The Gulag Archipelago, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
18. Julius Caesar, Shakespeare
19. 1984 (Signet Classics), George Orwell
20. The Aeneid (Penguin Classics), Virgil
21. Pericles’s Funeral Oration, Pericles; The Gettysburg Address, Lincoln
22. All Quiet on the Western Front, Remarque
23. The Analects (Penguin Classics), Confucius
24. The Prince, Machiavelli
25. Republic, Plato
26. On Liberty, John Stuart Mill
27. Le Morte Darthur (Norton Critical Editions), Sir Thomas Malory
28. Faust: Part 1 (Penguin Classics) (Pt. 1), Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
29. Faust: Part 2 (Penguin Classics) (Pt. 2), Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
30. Walden, Henry David Thoreau
31. The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Modern Library Classics), Gibbon
32. The History of Freedom, Lord Acton
33. On Moral Duties (De Officiis) & Treatise on the Common Wealth (From the Treatise on the Republic) (Two Books With Active Table of Contents), Cicero
34. Gandhi An Autobiography: The Story of My Experiments With Truth, Gandhi
35. My Early Life: 1874-1904; Painting As a Pastime; Winston S. Churchill THE SECOND WORLD WAR SERIES (6 BOOKS) (THE GATHERING STORM (1948) / THEIR FINEST HOUR (1949) / THE GRAND ALLIANCE (1950) / THE HINGE OF FATE (1950) / CLOSING THE RING (1951) / TRIUMPH AND TRAGEDY (1953)), Churchill

Why Read the 35 Books That Have Made History

Some of the books that have made history are downright depressing. But at the same time, I am glad that I read them. They gave my brain an intellectual workout. These 35 books that have made history will definitely give you an education. They will also make you think deeply. Not too many people do that these days. The ability to think deeply helps you to make better decisions. And that’s a very good thing because every day you have to make decisions. How many of these books have to read? And what did you think about them?

 Gilgamesh: A New English Version The Bacchae of Euripides The Gulag Archipelago Abridged: An Experiment in Literary Investigation (P.S.) All Quiet on the Western Front Walden and Civil Disobedience Gandhi: An Autobiography – The Story of My Experiments With Truth

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UPDATE: First Published July 201. This article contains Amazon affiliate links, which means if you click on a link and buy any of the books from Amazon, the company will pay me a small commission.