I read on That Wife today that the BBC believes most people have only read 6 books of the 100 in the list below. Although I had seen the meme on Facebook before, I was intrigued, because earlier today I had spent $100 on new books and was thinking that I need to get over this addiction called “reading.”

According to the instructions, you are supposed to put an ‘X’ after those you have read. Let’s see how I stack up…

1. Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen X
2. The Lord of the Rings – JRR Tolkien X
3. Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte X
4. Harry Potter series – JK Rowling X
5. To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee X
6. The Bible (most of it yes, but never cover to cover)
7. Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte X
8. Nineteen Eighty Four – George Orwell X
9. His Dark Materials – Philip Pullman
10. Great Expectations – Charles Dickens X
11. Little Women – Louisa M Alcott X
12. Tess of the D’Urbervilles – Thomas Hardy X
13. Catch-22 – Joseph Heller X
14. Complete Works of Shakespeare
15. Rebecca – Daphne Du Maurier
16. The Hobbit – JRR Tolkien X
17. Birdsong – Sebastian Faulk
18. Catcher in the Rye – JD Salinger X
19. The Time Traveler’s Wife – Audrey Niffenegger
20. Middlemarch – George Eliot
21. Gone With The Wind – Margaret Mitchell X
22. The Great Gatsby – F Scott Fitzgerald X
23. Bleak House – Charles Dickens
24. War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy X
25. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams X
26. Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh
27. Crime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoyevsky X
28. Grapes of Wrath – John Steinbeck X
29. Alice in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll X
30. The Wind in the Willows – Kenneth Grahame
31. Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy X
32. David Copperfield – Charles Dickens X
33. Chronicles of Narnia – CS Lewis X
34. Emma – Jane Austen X
35. Persuasion – Jane Austen
36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe – CS Lewis X
37. The Kite Runner – Khaled Hosseini X
38. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin – Louis De Bernieres
39. Memoirs of a Geisha – Arthur Golden X
40. Winnie the Pooh – AA Milne X
41. Animal Farm – George Orwell X
42. The Da Vinci Code – Dan Brown X
43. One Hundred Years of Solitude – Gabriel Garcia Marquez X
44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney – John Irving
45. The Woman in White – Wilkie Collins
46. Anne of Green Gables – LM Montgomery X
47. Far From The Madding Crowd – Thomas Hardy
48. The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood X
49. Lord of the Flies – William Golding X
50. Atonement – Ian McEwan
51. Life of Pi – Yann Martel X
52. Dune – Frank Herbert X
53. Cold Comfort Farm – Stella Gibbons
54. Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen X
55. A Suitable Boy – Vikram Seth
56. The Shadow of the Wind – Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57. A Tale Of Two Cities – Charles Dickens X
58. Brave New World – Aldous Huxley
59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime – Mark Haddon X
60. Love In The Time Of Cholera – Gabriel Garcia Marquez X
61. Of Mice and Men – John Steinbeck X
62. Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov X
63. The Secret History – Donna Tartt
64. The Lovely Bones – Alice Sebold X
65. Count of Monte Cristo – Alexandre Dumas X
66. On The Road – Jack Kerouac
67. Jude the Obscure – Thomas Hardy
68. Bridget Jones’s Diary – Helen Fielding X
69. Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
70. Moby Dick – Herman Melville X
71. Oliver Twist – Charles Dickens X
72. Dracula – Bram Stoker X
73. The Secret Garden – Frances Hodgson Burnett X
74. Notes From A Small Island – Bill Bryson
75. Ulysses – James Joyce X
76. The Inferno – Dante X
77. Swallows and Amazons – Arthur Ransome
78. Germinal – Emile Zola
79. Vanity Fair – William Makepeace Thackeray
80. Possession – AS Byatt
81. A Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens X
82. Cloud Atlas – David Mitchell
83. The Color Purple – Alice Walker X
84. The Remains of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro
85. Madame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert
86. A Fine Balance – Rohinton Mistry
87. Charlotte’s Web – EB White X
88. The Five People You Meet In Heaven – Mitch Albom X
89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle X
90. The Faraway Tree Collection – Enid Blyton
91. Heart of Darkness – Joseph Conrad X
92. The Little Prince – Antoine De Saint-Exupery X
93. The Wasp Factory – Iain Banks
94. Watership Down – Richard Adams X
95. A Confederacy of Dunces – John Kennedy Toole
96. A Town Like Alice – Nevil Shute
97. The Three Musketeers – Alexandre Dumas X
98. Hamlet – William Shakespeare X
99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – Roald Dahl X
100. 100 Les Miserables – Victor Hugo X

My total is 62. I also decided to bold my favorites on the list.

To be completely honest I was a bit disappointed in myself, until I did a fast Google and Facebook search and saw that my number was way above the average. What can I say? I love reading.

During my Google search I also found an interesting tidbit of informaton: the BBC never seems to have compiled such a list, or made such a claim. Pro-Science claims that the closest list he could find was the BBC’s The Big Read Top 100, and after doing some research this seems to be true. In fact, the list above is actually compiled by The Guardian – they are the top 100 books from an online poll taken in 2007 in celebration of World Book Day.

Here is my BBC list (I’ve again bolded my favorites):

1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien X
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen X
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams X
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling X
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee X
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne X
8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell X
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis X
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë X
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller X
12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë X
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger X
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens X
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott X
19. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy X
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell X
22. Harry Potter And The Philosopher’s Stone, JK Rowling X
    
23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling X
    
24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling X
25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien X
26. Tess Of The D’Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy X
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot
28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck X
30. Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll X
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez X
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens X
35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl X
36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson X
37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion, Jane Austen
39. Dune, Frank Herbert X
40. Emma, Jane Austen X
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery X
42. Watership Down, Richard Adams X
43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald X
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas X
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm, George Orwell X
47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens X
48. Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett X
52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck X
53. The Stand, Stephen King X
54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy X
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
56. The BFG, Roald Dahl X
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell X
59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer X
60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky X
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden X
63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens X
64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough
65. Mort, Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman X
69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding X
71. Perfume, Patrick Süskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda, Roald Dahl X
75. Bridget Jones’s Diary, Helen Fielding X
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses, James Joyce X
79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens
80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits, Roald Dahl X
82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith
83. Holes, Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac
91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo X
92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel X
93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett X
94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho X
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
96. Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez X
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot X
100. Midnight’s Children, Salman Rushdie

I did slightly worse on this list, having only read 57.

How many have you read?

After having purchased today’s books, I updated my Facebook status with:

Hyojin Jenny Hwang just spent $100 on books…AGAIN. I really need to get over this addiction called “reading.”

Several people asked why I just don’t get a library card. The answer is simple: I just love books too much. I responded,

Unfortunately I’m a weirdo who likes forming “intimate relationships” with my books (folding pages over, marking passages, making notes in the margins, etc). I LOVE interacting with new books and “breaking them in” so that they become a part of me. Some of my favorite books are so worn and dog-eared that they look like they should be thrown away, but I love them because I made them that way. Yes, I’m a huge book nerd.

And this is precisely the reason I would never get a Kindle or another e-reader. A Kindle would be more convenient, sure. But I long for the dry rustling pages between your fingers. The rich texture of leather-bound copies. The smell of newly inked books. The smell of old, musty books. And what is printed on those pages? Oh, my.

I love, and need my books.