Treasury · Merit

Harvard Classics

The fifty volumes Charles W. Eliot chose in 1909 as a liberal education on a five-foot shelf. Old, Western, and unapologetically canonical.

126 books in the catalog stand on this list. The list itself (opens the list's own website) ↗

A reader aged

25 of these books cover age 14. The 98 that name no age at all are left off rather than guessed at — choose any age to bring them back.

• All for Love, or, The World Well Lost by John Dryden, 1678 · ages 13–16
  Remember
• Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy, 1878 · ages 14–18 · Lexile 1080L · AR 9.6 · AR Interest: UG (9–12)
  also on Mensa Kids
  Remember
• Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin, 1791 · ages 14–18 · Lexile 1370L · AR 11.8 · AR Interest: UG (9–12)
  also on Mensa Kids, TJEd Youth Recommended
  Remember
• Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky, 1866 · ages 14–18 · Lexile 900L · AR 8.7 · AR Interest: UG (9–12)
  also on Mensa Kids
  Remember
• David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, 1850 · ages 12–15 · Lexile 1070L · AR 9.5
  also on Deep Roots Grade, TJEd Youth Recommended
  Remember
• Don Quixote, Part 1 by Miguel Cervantes, 1612 · ages 14–18 · Lexile 1410L · AR 13.2 · AR Interest: UG (9–12)
  also on Davidson Gifted, Mensa Kids, St. John's College, TJEd Youth Recommended
  Remember
• Essays, Civil and Moral & The New Atlantis by Francis Bacon, 1600 · ages 14–17
  Remember
• Faust by Johann Wolfgang Goethe, 1829 · ages 14–17
  also on St. John's College, TJEd Adult Recommended
  Remember
• Hamlet by William Shakespeare, 1603 · ages 14–18 · Lexile 650L · AR 10.5 · AR Interest: UG (9–12)
  also on Mensa Kids, St. John's College, TJEd Youth Recommended
  Remember
• I Promessi Sposi (The Betrothed) by Alessandro Manzoni, 1840 · ages 13–17
  Remember
• Jim Smily and His Jumping Frog by Mark Twain, 1865 · ages 14–17 · Lexile 1000L · AR 6.9
  Remember
• Pepita Jimenez by Juan Valera, 1874 · ages 14–18 · AR 6.6 · AR Interest: UG (9–12)
  Remember
• Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan, 1678 · ages 14–18 · Lexile 1030L · AR 10.4 · AR Interest: UG (9–12)
  also on Deep Roots Grade, Mensa Kids
  Remember
• Pride & Prejudice by Jane Austen, 1813 · ages 12–17 · Lexile 1070L · AR 12.0
  also on Deep Roots Grade, Mensa Kids, St. John's College, The Good & The Beautiful, TJEd Adult Recommended
  Remember
• Rip Van Winkle by Washington Irving, 1819 · ages 9–14 · Lexile 1280L · AR 11.1 · AR Interest: MG (4–8)
  also on Mensa Kids, TJEd Early Recommended
  Remember
• She Stoops to Conquer by Oliver Goldsmith, 1773 · ages 14–17
  Remember
• The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving, 1820 · ages 14–18 · Lexile 1460L · AR 11.0 · AR Interest: UG (9–12)
  also on Mensa Kids, TJEd Early Recommended
  Remember
• The Life of Sir Thomas More by William Roper, 1530 · ages 13–17
  Remember
• The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot, 1860 · ages 14–18 · Lexile 1240L · AR 9.9 · AR Interest: UG (9–12)
  Remember
• The Odyssey by Homer, -800 · ages 14–18 · Lexile 1050L · AR 10.3 · AR Interest: UG (9–12)
  also on Mensa Kids, St. John's College, TJEd Adult Recommended
  Remember
• The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli, 1513 · ages 14–18 · Lexile 1450L · AR 9.3 · AR Interest: UG (9–12)
  also on St. John's College, TJEd Adult Recommended
  Remember
• The School for Scandal by Richard Brinsley Sheridan, 1777 · ages 14–17
  Remember
• The Voyage of the Beagle by Charles Darwin, 1839 · ages 14–18 · Lexile 1220L · AR 13.4 · AR Interest: UG (9–12)
  Remember
• Utopia by Sir Thomas More trans. by Paul Turner, 1516 · ages 13–17 · Lexile 1390L
  also on TJEd Adult Recommended
  Remember
• Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, 1776 · ages 14–17 · Lexile 1500L
  also on St. John's College, TJEd Adult Recommended
  Remember