The Story of the Bass: New Video Gives Us 500 Years of Music History in 8 Minutes

in History, Music | November 25th, 2013

Out­side of mod­ern jazz, bass play­ers have a hard time. Peo­ple either for­get they exist—“John Bon­ham, Jim­my Page, Robert Plant, and … oh yeah, that oth­er guy…”—or they get car­i­ca­tured as the goofi­est mem­bers of the band, due per­haps to the instrument’s unwield­i­ness and the rock­ing-at-the waist motions its awk­ward dimen­sions inspire. The phys­i­cal pos­tures of bassists have lent far too many per­fect pho­to­graph­ic moments to the viral Bass Dogs tum­blr, which imag­ines bass play­ers tick­ling giant, often embar­rassed-look­ing dogs.

But meme-ing aside, the bass occu­pies a cru­cial space, cov­er­ing a fre­quen­cy range and rhyth­mic dimen­sion with­out which we could not be tru­ly moved by mod­ern pop or clas­si­cal music, either in spir­it or body. And while the low end doesn’t clam­or for our attention—like the upper ranges of a chanteuse’s voice, a wail­ing lead gui­tar, or crash­ing cymbals—and can get lost in the tin­ny sounds of ear­buds and cheap radios, we sim­ply can­not do with­out the sound of the bass. To demon­strate what a propul­sive force the bass has been in the evo­lu­tion of music over the cen­turies, col­lec­tive CDZA—who have pre­vi­ous­ly enter­tained and enlight­ened us about the gui­tar solo—fea­ture bassist Michael Thurber in a greatest-hits-who’s‑who his­to­ry les­son, “The Sto­ry of the Bass.”

We begin with that baroque pre­cur­sor to the con­tra bass (or dou­ble bass), the vio­la da gam­ba, which Bach wrote for in his cel­lo suites and in da gam­ba and harp­si­chord pieces. When we come to the 18th cen­tu­ry, we are in the dou­ble bass world of bril­liant vir­tu­oso play­er and com­pos­er Domeni­co Drag­onet­ti, beloved of Haydn and Beethoven (hear a mes­mer­iz­ing Drag­onet­ti con­cer­to above). We then move through the 19th cen­tu­ry with names like Serge Kous­se­vitzky, pop­u­lar­iz­er of the 4‑string dou­ble bass we know today.

With jazz in the ‘20s , the fin­ger pluck­ing style comes to stand in for the tuba of pro­to-jazz Sousa bands. Then the 4‑note walk­ing bassline comes to the fore, brought most famous­ly by Duke Elling­ton bass­man Well­man Braud. In the 40s and 50s, bass took a spot­light with, among many oth­ers, three more some­time Elling­ton bassists: Jim­my Blan­ton, Oscar Pet­ti­ford, and, espe­cial­ly, Charles Min­gus.

The video zooms through country/bluegrass/rockabilly dou­ble bass inno­va­tions with a too-brief men­tion of slap bass tech­nique before Thurber straps on a clas­sic elec­tric to intro­duce but one of Leo Fender’s con­tri­bu­tions to mod­ern music. The first elec­tric bass debuted in 1951, and at the time, only one per­son played it, Monk (erro­neous­ly called “Mark” by CDZA) Mont­gomery, one of a trio of musi­cal broth­ers, who played for Lionel Hampton’s band.

As we get into the post-war peri­od, the bass evolves as rapid­ly as the tech­nolo­gies of ampli­fi­ca­tion, broad­cast, and record­ing. With the dom­i­nance of Motown in the six­ties, the bass takes a lead role in R&B, with the immor­tal James Jamer­son lead­ing the way (above with Jack­son 5). And with British rock and roll, the bass is again pushed to the fore­front by, of course, Paul McCart­ney. New tech­niques abound—John Entwistle of The Who’s fin­ger pluck­ing style, Lar­ry Graham’s slap­ping, the funk/rock/soul sig­na­tures of Nathan Watts, John Paul Jones, and Chris Squire. Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters stands alone as a sin­gu­lar voice on the bass.

Once Thurber reach­es off-the-wall instru­men­tal­ists like Jaco Pas­to­ri­ous (above) and Flea (one is sad­dened Les Clay­pool doesn’t get a name check), we’re off to the races, any­thing goes, and oth­er clichés. Or how about a pun? It’s a bass race to rede­fine the instru­ment until the oughties, when it set­tles back in for folk and six­ties rock revival­ism and explodes in the synth lines of the hard dance revival­ism of dub­step. It’s a rol­lick­ing ride, and as any 8‑and-a-half minute his­to­ry les­son is bound to be, a sur­vey in broad strokes that sure­ly leaves out a cou­ple or dozen of your favorites (Boot­sie Collins? Ged­dy Lee? Peter Hook? Kim Deal? Rob­bie Shake­speare?). But on the whole, it’s an instruc­tive tour of a neglect­ed or maligned instru­ment that deserves much more respect than it gets.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

The Evo­lu­tion of the Rock Gui­tar Solo: 28 Solos, Span­ning 50 Years, Played in 6 Fun Min­utes

The Fun­da­men­tals of Jazz & Rock Drum­ming Explained in Five Cre­ative Min­utes

An Abridged His­to­ry of West­ern Music: “What a Won­der­ful World” Sung in 16 Dif­fer­ent Styles

Josh Jones is a writer and musi­cian based in Durham, NC. Fol­low him at @jdmagness

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Noam Chomsky on Commemorating the JFK Assassination: It “Would Impress Kim Il-Sung”

in Current Affairs, History | November 24th, 2013

jfk chomskyIn recent decades, his­to­ri­ans have tried to offer a bal­anced assess­ment of JFK’s life and lega­cy, offer­ing clear-eyed accounts of his han­dling of for­eign and domes­tic pol­i­cy, and rais­ing ques­tions about his infi­deli­ties and health prob­lems, all the while chip­ping away at the Camelot myth. On Fri­day, the 50th anniver­sary of the Kennedy assas­si­na­tion, the hagiog­ra­phy returned, and even peren­ni­al cads like Rush Lim­baugh had lit­tle bad to say about Amer­i­ca’s 35th pres­i­dent. He sim­ply insist­ed that JFK would be a con­ser­v­a­tive, if still alive today.

Per­haps the only notable excep­tion was Noam Chom­sky. Nev­er a fan of Kennedy (or prob­a­bly any oth­er Amer­i­can pres­i­dent for that mat­ter), Chom­sky was asked by Truthout, “Do you find it odd that the coun­try is focus­ing on a 50th anniver­sary remem­brance of the Kennedy assas­si­na­tion?” A lead­ing ques­tion, no doubt, to which Chomksy replied, “Wor­ship of lead­ers is a tech­nique of indoc­tri­na­tion that goes back to the crazed George Wash­ing­ton cult of the 18th cen­tu­ry and on to the tru­ly lunatic Rea­gan cult of today, both of which would impress Kim Il-sung. The JFK cult is sim­i­lar.” It’s what you get when you live in “a deeply indoc­tri­nat­ed soci­ety.” If you’re ready to have Chom­sky throw more cold water (or is it com­bustible gaso­line?) on the JFK lega­cy, head over to Truthout for more.

P.S. Don’t shoot the mes­sen­ger on this…

via Leit­er Reports

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Noam Chom­sky Slams Žižek and Lacan: Emp­ty ‘Pos­tur­ing’

Clash of the Titans: Noam Chom­sky and Michel Fou­cault Debate Human Nature and Pow­er on Dutch TV, 1971

Noam Chom­sky vs. William F. Buck­ley, 1969

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November 22, 1963: Watch Errol Morris’ Short Documentary About the Kennedy Assassination

in History, Photography | November 22nd, 2013

We live in a fine time for con­spir­a­cy the­o­rists, in at least a cou­ple of sens­es. First and more broad­ly, giv­en the pow­er of the inter­net, they’ve nev­er had clos­er at hand the semi-incrim­i­nat­ing, half-hid­den pieces of infor­ma­tion on which they build and with which they bol­ster their sus­pi­cions. Nor have they ever had a more effec­tive means of gath­er­ing and dis­cussing their find­ings. Sec­ond and more specif­i­cal­ly, the 50th anniver­sary of the assas­si­na­tion of Pres­i­dent John F. Kennedy has come upon us. This has set all those fas­ci­nat­ed by that grim his­tor­i­cal event, from the sober­est of skep­tics to the sheer­est para­noiacs, eval­u­at­ing and re-eval­u­at­ing it even more thor­ough­ly than usu­al. Above you’ll find the short Novem­ber 22, 1963 by Errol Mor­ris, a clear-eyed doc­u­men­tar­i­an and inter­view­er fas­ci­nat­ed not only with those who con­spire and those who the­o­rize about such con­spir­a­cies, but also with the grander implic­it ques­tions about what we know and what we don’t, what we can know and what we can’t, and whether we even know what we can and can’t know in the first place. (The title of his new fea­ture-length doc­u­men­tary about Don­ald Rums­feld: The Unknown Known.)

“The more you inves­ti­gate a crime, the more it becomes crys­tal-clear what hap­pened,” says Josi­ah “Tink” Thomp­son, schol­ar of Søren Kierkegaard, pri­vate detec­tive, and author of Six Sec­onds in Dal­las: A Micro-Study of the Kennedy Assas­si­na­tion (a book with which any­one who has seen Richard Lin­klater’s Slack­er will already feel some famil­iar­i­ty). “I don’t think any oth­er crime I know of in his­to­ry has been inves­ti­gat­ed with the kind of inten­si­ty that this has. And yet I don’t think we get any clos­er to know­ing what hap­pened now than we were 40, 45 years ago.” This opens a dis­cus­sion of how all the pho­to­graph­ic evi­dence of 11/22/63, up to and includ­ing the awe­some­ly scru­ti­nized Zaprud­er film, bears on the mat­ter. “Is there a les­son to be learned?” Mor­ris asks. “Yes, to nev­er give up try­ing to uncov­er the truth. Despite all the dif­fi­cul­ties, what hap­pened in Dal­las hap­pened in one way rather than anoth­er. It may have been hope­less­ly obscured, but it was not oblit­er­at­ed.” And just as Novem­ber 22, 1963 fol­lows up The Umbrel­la Man, Mor­ris’ pre­vi­ous piece with Thomp­son, Thomp­son has a sequel of his own in the works: a book called Last Sec­onds in Dal­las. JFK assas­si­na­tion nuts — and I mean that in the nicest way — have their read­ing ahead of them.

Novem­ber 22, 1963 will be added to the Doc­u­men­tary sec­tion of our col­lec­tion of 600 Free Movies Online.

Relat­ed con­tent:

Revis­it­ing JFK on YouTube

Who Killed JFK? Two New Stud­ies

Film­mak­er Errol Mor­ris Gives Us “11 Excel­lent Rea­sons Not to Vote?”

Col­in Mar­shall hosts and pro­duces Note­book on Cities and Cul­ture and writes essays on lit­er­a­ture, film, cities, Asia, and aes­thet­ics. He’s at work on a book about Los Ange­les, A Los Ange­les Primer. Fol­low him on Twit­ter at @colinmarshall.

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Actress Grace Kelly Reflects on the Life & Legacy of JFK in an Artfully Animated Video

in Animation, History | November 21st, 2013

On the eve of the 50th anniver­sary of the John F. Kennedy Assas­si­na­tion, Blank on Blank has released anoth­er one of its dis­tinc­tive ani­mat­ed videos. This one fea­tures Grace Kel­ly, the glam­orous Amer­i­can actress and Princess of Mona­co, con­tem­plat­ing her per­son­al encoun­ters with JFK, the heady days of Camelot, and the lega­cy of Amer­i­ca’s 35th pres­i­dent. When asked whether the pres­i­dent died in vain on that day in Dal­las, she offered these elo­quent words:

Well, it might not seem so today, but I, for one, can­not believe that a man of Mr. Kennedy’s stature and achieve­ments was put upon this earth for no oth­er pur­pose than to stop an assassin’s bul­let, or that the les­son will be whol­ly lost. It is only since the twen­ti­eth cen­tu­ry that the majesty of Abra­ham Lin­coln has been appre­ci­at­ed. I believe that God allows these cer­tain tragedies to hap­pen in order to empha­size the man and his achieve­ments and to inspire those who fol­low to have the strength and the will to accom­plish his unful­filled dreams.

This inter­view was record­ed on June 19, 1965, as part of an oral his­to­ry project designed to pre­serve the mem­o­ry of the late pres­i­dent. The project record­ed inter­views with peo­ple from all walks of life–from bus dri­vers to Leonard Bernstein–but, as David Ger­lach, founder of Blank on Blank explains to us, few peo­ple have heard these record­ings over the years. Now, how­ev­er, a Boston-based radio project has turned them into an hour­long radio doc­u­men­tary called We Knew JFK: Unheard Sto­ries, and it’s avail­able online here.

You can read a tran­script of the Grace Kel­ly inter­view cour­tesy of the John F. Kennedy Pres­i­den­tial Library & Muse­um.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Kurt Von­negut to John F. Kennedy: ‘On Occa­sion, I Write Pret­ty Well’

Watch Janis Joplin’s Final Inter­view Reborn as an Ani­mat­ed Car­toon

Mar­shall McLuhan on the Stu­pid­est Debate in the His­to­ry of Debat­ing (Nixon v JFK)

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Watch Leonardo da Vinci’s Musical Invention, the Viola Organista, Being Played for the Very First Time

in History, Music | November 20th, 2013

Just yes­ter­day, we made ref­er­ence to Leonar­do da Vin­ci’s con­tri­bu­tion to ear­ly con­cepts of mechan­i­cal cal­cu­la­tion. But if that sub­set of his achieve­ments does­n’t inter­est you, may we sug­gest you look into his oth­er work in paint­ing, sculp­ture, archi­tec­ture, math­e­mat­ics, engi­neer­ing, anato­my, geol­o­gy, car­tog­ra­phy, botany, and let­ters? Then again, you might find this a par­tic­u­lar­ly oppor­tune time to learn more about Leonar­do da Vin­ci the musi­cian. As the arche­typ­al exam­ple of the poly­math­ic, intel­lec­tu­al­ly omniv­o­rous “Renais­sance man,” he not only attained mas­tery of a wide range of dis­ci­plines, but did his most impres­sive work in the spaces between them. Giv­en the volu­mi­nous­ness of his out­put (not to men­tion the tech­ni­cal lim­i­ta­tions of fif­teenth-cen­tu­ry Europe), many of his mul­ti­ple domain-span­ning ideas and inven­tions nev­er became a real­i­ty dur­ing his life­time. How­ev­er, just this year, 494 years after Leonar­do’s death, we now have the chance to see, and more impor­tant­ly hear, one of them: the vio­la organ­ista, an elab­o­rate musi­cal instru­ment that had pre­vi­ous­ly only exist­ed in his note­books.

We owe this thrill not just to Leonar­do him­self, who left behind detailed plans for the (to him, pure­ly the­o­ret­i­cal) con­struc­tion of such devices as this behind, but to a report­ed 5000 hours of phys­i­cal effort by Pol­ish con­cert pianist Sla­womir Zubrzy­c­ki, who actu­al­ly put the thing togeth­er. You can read more at the Syd­ney Morn­ing Her­ald, whose arti­cle (on “Leonar­do Da Vin­ci’s wacky piano”) quotes Zubrzy­c­ki: “This instru­ment has the char­ac­ter­is­tics of three we know: the harp­si­chord, the organ and the vio­la da gam­ba,” and play­ing it, which involves hit­ting keys con­nect­ed to “spin­ning wheels wrapped in horse-tail hair,” and turn­ing those wheels by pump­ing a ped­al below the key­board, pro­duces excit­ing unusu­al waves of cel­lo-like sounds. You can watch ten min­utes of Zubrzy­c­ki debut­ing the instru­ment at Krakow’s Acad­e­my of Music above. Depend­ing upon your incli­na­tion toward music, very old tech­nol­o­gy, or very old music tech­nol­o­gy, you may also want to glance at the relat­ed Metafil­ter debate about what place the vio­la organ­ista could have in music today.

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. It’s a great way to see our new posts, all bun­dled in one email, each day.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent:

The Anatom­i­cal Draw­ings of Renais­sance Man, Leonar­do da Vin­ci

An Ani­mat­ed His­to­ry Of Avi­a­tion: From da Vinci’s Sketch­es to Apol­lo 11

What Ancient Greek Music Sound­ed Like: Hear a Recon­struc­tion That is ‘100% Accu­rate’

Col­in Mar­shall hosts and pro­duces Note­book on Cities and Cul­ture and writes essays on lit­er­a­ture, film, cities, Asia, and aes­thet­ics. He’s at work on a book about Los Ange­les, A Los Ange­les Primer. Fol­low him on Twit­ter at @colinmarshall.

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Stephen Colbert & Louis CK Recite The Gettysburg Address, With Some Help from Jerry Seinfeld

in Comedy, History, Politics | November 19th, 2013

On a Thurs­day after­noon in Novem­ber of 1863, Edward Everett took to the stage in Get­tys­burg, Penn­syl­va­nia, to deliv­er the main address at the Con­se­cra­tion Cer­e­mo­ny of the Nation­al Ceme­tery. Everett was a politi­cian who had served as both a clas­sics pro­fes­sor and pres­i­dent of Har­vard Uni­ver­si­ty, and was also a renowned ora­tor. His address to the 15,000-strong crowd began on the fol­low­ing grandil­o­quent note, which Everett pro­ceed­ed to hold for two hours:

“Stand­ing beneath this serene sky, over­look­ing these broad fields now repos­ing from the labors of the wan­ing year, the mighty Alleghe­nies dim­ly tow­er­ing before us, the graves of our brethren beneath our feet, it is with hes­i­ta­tion that I raise my poor voice to break the elo­quent silence of God and Nature. But the duty to which you have called me must be per­formed; grant me, I pray you, your indul­gence and your sym­pa­thy.”

Despite this wave of lofty sen­ti­ment, Everett’s speech was over­shad­owed by the 278-word for­mu­la­tion that would for­ev­er com­mem­o­rate that day, deliv­ered by Abra­ham Lin­coln.

Unlike Everett’s remarks, Lincoln’s Get­tys­burg address (whose five ver­sions can be found here) has shown lit­tle wear since its deliv­ery on Novem­ber 19, exact­ly 150 years ago. While there is some evi­dence to sug­gest that the audi­ence was ini­tial­ly non­plussed by the speech’s sim­ple lan­guage and strik­ing brevi­ty, today Lincoln’s words are con­sid­ered to be among the most fine­ly wrought rhetoric in the West­ern canon: they remain acces­si­ble to all, yet seam­less­ly entwine the thread of equal­i­ty that ran so clear­ly through the Dec­la­ra­tion of Inde­pen­dence with the idea of the war being essen­tial to the preser­va­tion of the Union. One can­not help but sus­pect that hon­est Abe failed to grasp the impact that his pithy ora­tion would have; Everett’s sub­se­quent com­ments to the Pres­i­dent, how­ev­er, pre­fig­ured the speech’s his­tor­i­cal arc:

“I should be glad if I could flat­ter myself that I came as near to the cen­tral idea of the occa­sion, in two hours, as you did in two min­utes.”

In hon­or of the 150th anniver­sary of Lincoln’s deliv­ery of the Get­tys­burg address, doc­u­men­tar­i­an Ken Burns has embarked on a project called Learn The Address in an attempt to get Amer­i­cans to record their recita­tions of the speech. In the mashup below, Burns pro­vides footage of politi­cians, enter­tain­ers, and jour­nal­ists giv­ing their ren­di­tions. We’ve also includ­ed some of our favorites, includ­ing Stephen Colbert’s high­ly com­i­cal mono­logue (top) and Jer­ry Sein­feld explain­ing the sig­nif­i­cance of the address to Louis CK, right above.

For more ver­sions of Lin­col­n’s Get­tys­burg address, includ­ing those by Pres­i­dent Oba­ma, Conan O’Brien, and Bill O’Reil­ly, head to Ken Burn’s Learn The Address site.

Ilia Blin­d­er­man is a Mon­tre­al-based cul­ture and sci­ence writer. Fol­low him at @iliablinderman.

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Watch Houdini Escape From a Strait Jacket, Then See How He Did It (Circa 1917)

in History, Life | November 18th, 2013

Claus­tro­phobes, take cau­tion, and for pity’s sake, don’t try this at home!

Should such warn­ings leave you unde­terred, PBS has step-by-step instruc­tions for per­form­ing Hou­dini’s strait jack­et escape. Well, almost step-by-step. Derived from the mas­ter’s own 1909 Hand­cuff Secrets, the direc­tions are both vague and hor­ri­fy­ing in their speci­fici­ty, falling some­where between assem­bling an Ikea book­shelf and 127 Hours.

In need of more guid­ance? Have a look below at the how-to Hou­di­ni shared with Ladies Home Jour­nal in 1918. (He also gave advice to gen­teel, post-WWI female read­ers on how to escape rope bondage.)

houdini escape

For a more man­age­able trick, imag­ine your­self a face in the crowd, gaz­ing upward at the strug­gling magi­cian, with­out tex­ting, tweet­ing, or Insta­gram­ming. Sheer open-mouthed amaze­ment is a trick we see pre­cious lit­tle of these days.

Our best guess is that the video above was shot around 1917.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Har­ry Houdini’s Great Rope Escape

Arthur Conan Doyle Dis­cuss­es Sher­lock Holmes and Psy­chics in a Rare Filmed Inter­view (1927)

Ayun Hal­l­i­day’s lat­est feat is direct­ing 16 home­schooled teens in Yeast Nation, the world’s first bio-his­tor­i­cal musi­cal. See it in New York City this week. Fol­low her @AyunHalliday

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The 100 Best Novels: A Literary Critic Creates a List in 1898

in History, Literature | November 14th, 2013

old books 32Book lists, despite what younger read­ers born into Buzzfeed’s ruth­less list­si­cle monop­oly may think, have always been pop­u­lar. Some, like David Bowie’s Top 100 Books, give us a sense of the artist’s devel­op­ment. Oth­ers, like Joseph Brodsky’s List of 84 Books for Basic Con­ver­sa­tion, pro­vide a Nobel prize-win­ning bench­mark for knowl­edge. Even though the books are with­in the reach of most read­ers, sys­tem­at­i­cal­ly digest­ing such lists often tries one’s patience. Despite the lack of will or inter­est in work­ing through some­one else’s lit­er­ary edu­ca­tion, how­ev­er, glanc­ing through such per­son­al antholo­gies pro­vides us with a glimpse into the maker’s life—be it their pri­vate tastes, or their social mores.

In late Octo­ber, The Times Lit­er­ary Supplement’s Michael Caines unearthed anoth­er Top 100 list; this one, how­ev­er, has the dis­tinc­tion of hail­ing from 1898. At the turn of the 20th cen­tu­ry, a jour­nal­ist and author of numer­ous books on the Bron­të sis­ters named Clement K. Short­er tried his hand at com­pil­ing the 100 Best Nov­els for a jour­nal called The Book­man. The ground rules were sim­ple: the list could fea­ture only one nov­el per nov­el­ist, and liv­ing authors were exclud­ed.  Today, Shorter’s com­pendi­um looks some­what hit-or-miss. There are some indis­putable clas­sics (many of which can be found in our Free eBooks and Free Audio Books col­lec­tions) and some oth­er texts that have fad­ed into obliv­ion. Still—one can’t help but expe­ri­ence a cer­tain his­tor­i­cal fris­son at a 19th cen­tu­ry list­si­cle. Here it goes:

1. Don Quixote — 1604 — Miguel de Cer­vantes

2. The Holy War — 1682 — John Bun­yan

3. Gil Blas — 1715 — Alain René le Sage

4. Robin­son Cru­soe — 1719 — Daniel Defoe

5. Gul­liv­er’s Trav­els — 1726 — Jonathan Swift

6. Rod­er­ick Ran­dom — 1748 — Tobias Smol­lett

7. Claris­sa — 1749 — Samuel Richard­son

8. Tom Jones — 1749 — Hen­ry Field­ing

9. Can­dide — 1756 — Françoise de Voltaire

10. Ras­se­las — 1759 — Samuel John­son

11. The Cas­tle of Otran­to — 1764 — Horace Wal­pole

12. The Vic­ar of Wake­field — 1766 — Oliv­er Gold­smith

13. The Old Eng­lish Baron — 1777 — Clara Reeve

14. Eveli­na — 1778 — Fan­ny Bur­ney

15. Vathek — 1787 — William Beck­ford

16. The Mys­ter­ies of Udolpho — 1794 — Ann Rad­cliffe

17. Caleb Williams — 1794 — William God­win

18. The Wild Irish Girl — 1806 — Lady Mor­gan

19. Corinne — 1810 — Madame de Stael

20. The Scot­tish Chiefs — 1810 — Jane Porter

21. The Absen­tee — 1812 — Maria Edge­worth

22. Pride and Prej­u­dice — 1813 — Jane Austen

23. Head­long Hall — 1816 — Thomas Love Pea­cock

24. Franken­stein — 1818 — Mary Shel­ley

25. Mar­riage — 1818 — Susan Fer­ri­er

26. The Ayr­shire Lega­tees — 1820 — John Galt

27. Valerius — 1821 — John Gib­son Lock­hart

28. Wil­helm Meis­ter — 1821 — Johann Wolf­gang von Goethe

29. Kenil­worth — 1821 — Sir Wal­ter Scott

30. Brace­bridge Hall — 1822 — Wash­ing­ton Irv­ing

31. The Epi­cure­an — 1822 — Thomas Moore

32. The Adven­tures of Hajji Baba — 1824 — James Mori­er (“usu­al­ly reck­oned his best”)

33. The Betrothed — 1825 — Alessan­dro Man­zoni

34. Licht­en­stein — 1826 — Wil­helm Hauff

35. The Last of the Mohi­cans — 1826 — Fen­i­more Coop­er

36. The Col­le­gians — 1828 — Ger­ald Grif­fin

37. The Auto­bi­og­ra­phy of Man­sie Wauch — 1828 — David M. Moir

38. Riche­lieu — 1829 — G. P. R. James (the “first and best” nov­el by the “doyen of his­tor­i­cal nov­el­ists”)

39. Tom Cringle’s Log — 1833 — Michael Scott

40. Mr. Mid­ship­man Easy — 1834 — Fred­er­ick Mar­ry­at

41. Le Père Gori­ot — 1835 — Hon­oré de Balzac

42. Rory O’More — 1836 — Samuel Lover (anoth­er first nov­el, inspired by one of the author’s own bal­lads)

43. Jack Brag — 1837 — Theodore Hook

44. Far­dor­ougha the Miser — 1839 — William Car­leton (“a grim study of avarice and Catholic fam­i­ly life. Crit­ics con­sid­er it the author’s finest achieve­ment”)

45. Valen­tine Vox — 1840 — Hen­ry Cock­ton (yet anoth­er first nov­el)

46. Old St. Paul’s — 1841 — Har­ri­son Ainsworth

47. Ten Thou­sand a Year — 1841 — Samuel War­ren (“immense­ly suc­cess­ful”)

48. Susan Hop­ley — 1841 — Cather­ine Crowe (“the sto­ry of a resource­ful ser­vant who solves a mys­te­ri­ous crime”)

49. Charles O’Mal­ley — 1841 — Charles Lever

50. The Last of the Barons — 1843 — Bul­w­er Lyt­ton

51. Con­sue­lo — 1844 — George Sand

52. Amy Her­bert — 1844 — Eliz­a­beth Sewell

53. Adven­tures of Mr. Led­bury — 1844 — Eliz­a­beth Sewell

54. Sybil — 1845 — Lord Bea­cons­field (a. k. a. Ben­jamin Dis­raeli)

55. The Three Mus­ke­teers — 1845 — Alexan­dre Dumas

56. The Wan­der­ing Jew — 1845 — Eugène Sue

57. Emil­ia Wyn­d­ham — 1846 — Anne Marsh

58. The Romance of War — 1846 — James Grant (“the nar­ra­tive of the 92nd High­landers’ con­tri­bu­tion from the Penin­su­lar cam­paign to Water­loo”)

59. Van­i­ty Fair — 1847 — W. M. Thack­er­ay

60. Jane Eyre — 1847 — Char­lotte Bron­të

61. Wuther­ing Heights — 1847 — Emi­ly Bron­të

62. The Vale of Cedars — 1848 — Grace Aguilar

63. David Cop­per­field — 1849 — Charles Dick­ens

64. The Maid­en and Mar­ried Life of Mary Pow­ell — 1850 — Anne Man­ning (“writ­ten in a pas­tiche sev­en­teenth-cen­tu­ry style and print­ed with the old-fash­ioned typog­ra­phy and page lay­out for which there was a vogue at the peri­od …”)

65. The Scar­let Let­ter — 1850 — Nathaniel Hawthorne

66. Frank Fair­leigh — 1850 — Fran­cis Smed­ley (“Smed­ley spe­cialised in fic­tion that is hearty and active, with a strong line in bois­ter­ous col­lege escapades and adven­tur­ous esques­tri­an exploits”)

67. Uncle Tom’s Cab­in — 1851 — H. B. Stowe

68. The Wide Wide World — 1851 — Susan Warn­er (Eliz­a­beth Wetherell)

69. Nathalie — 1851 — Julia Kavanagh

70. Ruth — 1853 — Eliz­a­beth Gaskell

71. The Lamp­lighter — 1854 — Maria Susan­na Cum­mins

72. Dr. Anto­nio — 1855 — Gio­van­ni Ruffi­ni

73. West­ward Ho! — 1855 — Charles Kings­ley

74. Deb­it and Cred­it (Soll und Haben) — 1855 — Gus­tav Frey­tag

75. Tom Brown’s School-Days — 1856 — Thomas Hugh­es

76. Barch­ester Tow­ers — 1857 — Antho­ny Trol­lope

77. John Hal­i­fax, Gen­tle­man — 1857 — Dinah Mulock (a. k. a. Dinah Craik; “the best-known Vic­to­ri­an fable of Smile­sian self-improve­ment”)

78. Ekke­hard — 1857 — Vik­tor von Schef­fel

79. Elsie Ven­ner — 1859 — O. W. Holmes

80. The Woman in White — 1860 — Wilkie Collins

81. The Clois­ter and the Hearth — 1861 — Charles Reade

82. Raven­shoe — 1861 — Hen­ry Kings­ley (“There is much con­fu­sion in the plot to do with changelings and frus­trat­ed inher­i­tance” in this suc­cess­ful nov­el by Charles Kings­ley’s younger broth­er, the “black sheep” of a “high­ly respectable” fam­i­ly)

83. Fathers and Sons — 1861 — Ivan Tur­ge­ni­eff

84. Silas Marn­er — 1861 — George Eliot

85. Les Mis­érables — 1862 — Vic­tor Hugo

86. Salamm­bô — 1862 — Gus­tave Flaubert

87. Salem Chapel — 1862 — Mar­garet Oliphant

88. The Chan­nings — 1862 — Ellen Wood (a. k. a. Mrs Hen­ry Wood)

89. Lost and Saved — 1863 — The Hon. Mrs. Nor­ton

90. The Schön­berg-Cot­ta Fam­i­ly — 1863 — Eliz­a­beth Charles

91. Uncle Silas — 1864 — Joseph Sheri­dan Le Fanu

92. Bar­bara’s His­to­ry — 1864 — Amelia B. Edwards (“Con­fus­ing­ly for bib­li­og­ra­phers, she was relat­ed to Matil­da Betham-Edwards and pos­si­bly to Annie Edward(e)s …”)

93. Sweet Anne Page — 1868 — Mor­timer Collins

94. Crime and Pun­ish­ment — 1868 — Feodor Dos­toieff­sky

95. Fromont Junior — 1874 — Alphonse Daudet

96. Mar­morne — 1877 — P. G. Hamer­ton (“writ­ten under the pseu­do­nym Adol­phus Seg­rave”)

97. Black but Come­ly — 1879 — G. J. Whyte-Melville

98. The Mas­ter of Bal­lantrae — 1889 — R. L. Steven­son

99. Reuben Sachs — 1889 — Amy Levy

100. News from Nowhere — 1891 — William Mor­ris

In addi­tion to the canon, Shorter—unable to heed his own cau­tious coun­sel and throw­ing the door open to the winds of lit­er­ary passion—included 8 books by liv­ing nov­el­ists whom he called “writ­ers whose rep­u­ta­tions are too well estab­lished for their juniors to feel towards them any sen­ti­ments oth­er than those of rev­er­ence and regard:”

An Egypt­ian Princess — 1864 — Georg Ebers

Rho­da Flem­ing — 1865 — George Mered­ith

Lor­na Doone — 1869 — R. D. Black­more

Anna Karen­i­na — 1875 — Count Leo Tol­stoi

The Return of the Native — 1878 — Thomas Hardy

Daisy Miller — 1878 — Hen­ry James

Mark Ruther­ford — 1881 — W. Hale White

Le Rêve — 1889 — Emile Zola

via The Times Lit­er­ary Sup­ple­ment

Relat­ed Con­tent:

David Bowie’s List of Top 100 Books

Christo­pher Hitchens Cre­ates a Read­ing List for Eight-Year-Old Girl

See Nobel Lau­re­ate Joseph Brodsky’s Read­ing List For Hav­ing an Intel­li­gent Con­ver­sa­tion

Ilia Blin­d­er­man is a Mon­tre­al-based cul­ture and sci­ence writer. Fol­low him at @iliablinderman 

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