Classics

Timeless Classics: Books for Young Readers

(original source: the National Endowment for the Humanities)

Kindergarten - 6th Grade | Grades 7 & 8 | Grades 9 - 12

Kindergarten through Grade 6

Either for reading by children or for reading to them.

Adamson, Joy

Born Free

Aesop

Fables

Alcott, Louisa May

Little Women

Andersen, Hans Christian

Fairy tales

Atwater, Richard and Florence

Mr. Popper's Penguins

Bailey, Carolyn Sherwin

Miss Hickory

Barrie, J.M.

Peter Pan

Baum, L. Frank

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

Bemelmans, Ludwig

Madeline series

Bond, Michael

A Bear Called Paddington

Boston, L.M.

The Children of Green Knowe

Brink, Carol Ryrie

Caddie Woodlawn

Brown, Margaret Wise

Goodnight, Moon

Brunhoff, Jean de

The Story of Babar

Burnett, Frances Hodgson

The Secret Garden

Burton, Virginia Lee

Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel

Butterworth, Oliver

The Enormous Egg

Clark, Ann Nolan

Secret of the Andes

Cleary, Beverly

Henry Huggins series

Coatsworth, Elizabeth

The Cat Who Went to Heaven

Dalgliesh, Alice

The Bears on Hemlock Mountain

The Courage of Sarah Noble

De Angeli, Marguerite

The Door in the Wall

De Jong, Meindert

The House of Sixty Fathers

The Wheel on the School

Dodge, Mary Mapes

Hans Brinker, or the Silver Skates

Du Bois, William Pene

The Twenty-One Balloons

Edmonds, Walter D.

The Matchlock Gun

Estes, Eleanor

Ginger Pye

Moffats series

Farley, Walter

The Black Stallion

Field, Rachel

Hitty, Her First Hundred Years

Fritz, Jean

The Cabin Faced West

Gilbreth, Frank B. and

Ernestine G. Carey

Cheaper By the Dozen

Gipson, Fred

Old Yeller

Godden, Rumer

The Mousewife

Grahame, Kenneth

The Reluctant Dragon

The Wind in the Willows

Gray, Elizabeth Janet

Adam of the Road

Grimm, Jacob and Wilhelm

Grimm's Fairy Tales

Hawes, Charles

The Dark Frigate

Haywood, Carolyn

Betsy series

Henry, Marguerite

King of the Wind

Misty of Chincoteague

Keith, Harold

Rifles for Watie

Kelly, Eric

The Trumpeter of Krakow

Kipling, Rudyard

Captains Courageous

Just So Stories for

Little Children

The Jungle Books

Kjelgaard, Jim

Big Red

Knight, Eric

Lassie Come Home

Krumgold, Joseph

...and Now Miguel

Onion John

LaFarge, Oliver

Laughing Boy

Lamb, Charles and Mary

Tales from Shakespeare

Latham, Jean Lee

Carry on, Mr. Bowditch

Lawson, Robert

Ben & Me

Rabbit Hill

Leaf, Munro

The Story of Ferdinand

Lear, Edward

Book of Nonsense

Lenski, Lois

Strawberry Girl

Lewis, C.S.

Chronicles of Narnia series

Lindgren, Astrid

Pippi Longstocking series

Lofting, Hugh

Doctor Doolittle series

London, Jack

The Call of the Wild

White Fang

MacDonald, Betty

Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle

MacGregor, Ellen

Miss Pickerell series

McCloskey, Robert

Blueberries for Sal

Homer Price

Make Way for Ducklings

McSwigan, Marie

Snow Treasure

Meigs, Cornelia

Invincible Louisa

Milne, A.A.

The House at Pooh Corner

Now We Are Six

When We Were Very Young

Winnie-the-Pooh

Minarik, Else Holmelund

Little Bear

Montgomery, L.M.

Anne of Green Gables

Mukerji, Dhan Ghopal

Gay-Neck, the Story of a Pigeon

Norton, Mary

The Borrowers series

O'Hara, Mary

My Friend Flicka

Pearce, Philippa

Tom's Midnight Garden

Perrault, Charles

Cinderella

Potter, Beatrix

The Tale of Peter Rabbit

Pyle, Howard

The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood

Rey, H.A.

Curious George series

Richter, Conrad

The Light in the Forest

Selden, George

The Cricket in Times Square

Seuss, Dr.

The Cat in the Hat

Sewell, Anna

Black Beauty

Sorenson, Virginia

Miracles on Maple Hill

Speare, Elizabeth George

The Witch of Blackbird Pond

Sperry, Armstrong

Call It Courage

Spyri, Johanna

Heidi

Steinbeck, John

The Red Pony

Stevenson, Robert Louis

A Child's Garden of Verses

Kidnapped

Treasure Island

Travers, Pamela L.

Mary Poppins series

Van Loon, Hendrik

The Story of Mankind

White, E.B.

Charlotte's Web

Stuart Little

Wilder, Laura Ingalls

Little House series

Williams, Margery

The Velveteen Rabbit

Wyss, Johann

Swiss Family Robinson

Zion, Gene

Harry the Dirty Dog

Kindergarten - 6th Grade | Grades 7 & 8 | Grades 9 - 12

Grades 7 and 8

Alcott, Louisa May

Little Men

Bagnold, Enid

National Velvet

Blackmore, Richard D.

Lorna Doone

Boulle, Pierre

The Bridge over the River Kwai

Bradbury, Ray

Dandelion Wine

Fahrenheit 451

The Illustrated Man

Martian Chronicles

Buchan, John

The Thirty-Nine Steps

Bunyan, John

The Pilgrim's Progress

Carroll, Lewis

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Through the Looking Glass

Clark, Walter

The Ox-Bow Incident

Cooper, James Fenimore

The Deerslayer

The Last of the Mohicans

Curie, Eve

Madame Curie: A Biography

Dana, Richard Henry

Two Years Before the Mast

Day, Clarence

Life with Father

Defoe, Daniel

Robinson Crusoe

Dickens, Charles

A Christmas Carol

Douglas, Lloyd C.

The Robe

Doyle, Arthur Conan

Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

Dumas, Alexander

The Count of Monte Christo

The Three Musketeers

Du Maurier, Daphne

Rebecca

Edmonds, Walter D.

Drums along the Mohawk

Ferber, Edna

Cimarron

Forbes, Esther

Johnny Tremain

Forester, C.S.

The African Queen

The Hornblower series

Frank, Anne

Diary of a Young Girl

Frost, Robert

Poems

Gallico, Paul

The Snow Goose

Gunther, John

Death Be Not Proud

Guthrie, A.B.

The Big Sky

Haggard, H. Rider

King Solomon's Mines

Hansberry, Lorraine

Raisin in the Sun

Hemingway, Ernest

The Old Man and the Sea

Hersey, John

A Bell for Adano

Hiroshima

The Wall

Heyerdahl, Thor

Kon-Tiki

Hilton, James

Goodbye, Mr. Chips

Lost Horizon

Hudson, W.H.

Green Mansions

Hughes, Richard

A High Wind in Jamaica

Hugo, Victor

The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Irving, Washington

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow

Keller, Helen

Story of My Life

Kennedy, John F.

Profiles in Courage

Kipling, Rudyard

Kim

Knowles, John

A Separate Peace

Lee, Harper

To Kill a Mockingbird

London, Jack

The Sea Wolf

Lord, Walter

A Night to Remember

Malory, Sir Thomas

Le Morte d'Arthur

Maxwell, Gavin

Ring of Bright Water

McCullers, Carson

Member of the Wedding

Michener, James

The Bridges at Toko-Ri

Mitchell, Margaret

Gone with the Wind

Nordhoff, Charles and J.N. Hall

Mutiny on the Bounty

O'Dell, Scott

Island of the Blue Dolphins

Orczy, Baroness Emma

The Scarlet Pimpernel

Paton, Alan

Cry, the Beloved Country

Pyle, Howard

Men of Iron

Rawlings, Marjorie Kinnan

The Yearling

Renault, Mary

The King Must Die

Roberts, Kenneth

Northwest Passage

Saint-Exupery, Antoine de

The Little Prince

Wind, Sand and Stars

Saki

Stories

Schaefer, Jack

Shane

Scott, Sir Walter

Ivanhoe

Shelley, Mary

Frankenstein

Smith, Betty

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

Steinbeck, John

The Pearl

Tortilla Flat

Stevenson, Robert Louis

The Black Arrow

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Stoker, Bram

Dracula

Thurber, James

The Thurber Carnival

Tolkien, J.R.R.

The Hobbit

The Lord of the Rings

Twain, Mark

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court

Innocents Abroad

Life on the Mississippi

The Prince and the Pauper

Verne, Jules

Around the World in Eighty Days

Journey to the Center of the Earth

Mysterious Island

20,000 Leagues under the Sea

Wallace, Lewis

Ben-Hur

Washington, Booker T.

Up from Slavery

Wells, H.G.

The Time Machine

War of the Worlds

Wharton, Edith

Ethan Frome

Wilder, Thornton

The Bridge of San Luis Rey

Wister, Owen

The Virginian

Yates, Elizabeth

Amos Fortune, Free Man

Kindergarten - 6th Grade | Grades 7 & 8 | Grades 9 - 12

Grades 9 through 12

Agee, James

A Death in the Family

Anderson, Sherwood

Winesburg, Ohio

Austen, Jane

Emma

Northanger Abbey

Pride and Prejudice

Sense and Sensibility

Baldwin, James

Go Tell It on the Mountain

Balzac, Honore de

Pere Goriot

Beckett, Samuel

Waiting for Godot

The Bible

Old Testament

New Testament

Bolt, Robert

A Man for All Seasons

Bronte, Charlotte

Jane Eyre

Bronte, Emily

Wuthering Heights

Browning, Robert

Poems

Buck, Pearl

The Good Earth

Butler, Samuel

The Way of All Flesh

Camus, Albert

The Plague

The Stranger

Cather, Willa

Death Comes for the Archbishop

My Antonia

Cervantes, Miguel

Don Quixote

Chaucer, Geoffrey

The Canterbury Tales

Chekhov, Anton

The Cherry Orchard

Chopin, Kate

The Awakening

Collins, Wilkie

The Moonstone

Conrad, Joseph

Heart of Darkness

Lord Jim

The Secret Sharer

Victory

Crane, Stephen

The Red Badge of Courage

Dante

The Divine Comedy

Defoe, Daniel

Moll Flanders

Dickens, Charles

Bleak House

David Copperfield

Great Expectations

Hard Times

Oliver Twist

A Tale of Two Cities

Dickinson, Emily

Poems

Dinesen, Isak

Out of Africa

Dostoevski, Fyodor

Brothers Karamazov

Crime and Punishment

Dreiser, Theodore

An American Tragedy

Sister Carrie

Eliot, George

Adam Bede

Middlemarch

Mill on the Floss

Silas Marner

Eliot, T.S.

Murder in the Cathedral

Ellison, Ralph

Invisible Man

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Essays

Faulkner, William

Absalom, Absalom!

As I Lay Dying

Intruder in the Dust

Light in August

The Sound and the Fury

Fielding, Henry

Joseph Andrews

Tom Jones

Fitzgerald, F. Scott

The Great Gatsby

Tender Is the Night

Flaubert, Gustave

Madame Bovary

Forster, E.M.

A Passage to India

A Room with a View

Franklin, Benjamin

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

Galsworthy, John

The Forsyte Saga

Golding, William

Lord of the Flies

Goldsmith, Oliver

She Stoops to Conquer

Graves, Robert

I, Claudius

Greene, Graham

The Heart of the Matter

The Power and the Glory

Hamilton, Edith

Mythology

Hardy, Thomas

Far From the Madding Crowd

Jude the Obscure

The Mayor of Casterbridge

The Return of the Native

Tess of the D'Urbervilles

Hawthorne, Nathaniel

The House of the Seven Gables

The Scarlet Letter

Hemingway, Ernest

A Farewell to Arms

For Whom the Bell Tolls

The Sun Also Rises

Henry, O.

Stories

Hersey, John

A Single Pebble

Hesse, Hermann

Demian

Siddhartha

Steppenwolf

Homer

The Iliad

The Odyssey

Hughes, Langston

Poems

Hugo, Victor

Les Miserables

Huxley, Aldous

Brave New World

Ibsen, Henrik

A Doll's House

An Enemy of the People

Ghosts

Hedda Gabler

The Master Builder

The Wild Duck

James, Henry

The American

Daisy Miller

Portrait of a Lady

The Turn of the Screw

Joyce, James

Portrait of the Artist

As a Young Man

Dubliners

Kafka, Franz

The Castle

Metamorphosis

The Trial

Keats, John

Poems

Kerouac, Jack

On the Road

Koestler, Arthur

Darkness at Noon

Lawrence, D.H.

Sons and Lovers

Lawrence, Jerome and Robert E. Lee

Inherit the Wind

Lewis, Sinclair

Arrowsmith

Babbitt

Main Street

Llewellyn, Richard

How Green Was My Valley

Machiavelli

The Prince

MacLeish, Archibald

J.B.

Mann, Thomas

Buddenbrooks

The Magic Mountain

Marlowe, Christopher

Dr. Faustus

Maugham, Somerset

Of Human Bondage

McCullers, Carson

The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter

Melville, Herman

Billy Budd

Moby-Dick

Typee

Miller, Arthur

The Crucible

Death of a Salesman

Monsarrat, Nicholas

The Cruel Sea

O'Neill, Eugene

The Emperor Jones

A Long Day's Journey into Night

Mourning Becomes Electra

Orwell, George

Animal Farm

1984

Pasternak, Boris

Doctor Zhivago

Poe, Edgar Allan

Short stories

Remarque, Erich

All Quiet on the Western Front

Rolvaag, O.E.

Giants in the Earth

Rostand, Edmond

Cyrano de Bergerac

Salinger, J.D.

The Catcher in the Rye

Sandburg, Carl

Abraham Lincoln: The Prairie Years

Abraham Lincoln: The War Years

Saroyan, William

The Human Comedy

Sayers, Dorothy

The Nine Tailors

Shakespeare, William

Plays and Sonnets

Shaw, George Bernard

Arms and the Man

Major Barbara

Pygmalion

Saint Joan

Sheridan, Richard B.

The School for Scandal

Shute, Nevil

On the Beach

Sinclair, Upton

The Jungle

Sophocles

Antigone

Oedipus Rex

Steinbeck, John

East of Eden

The Grapes of Wrath

Of Mice and Men

Stowe, Harriet Beecher

Uncle Tom's Cabin

Swift, Jonathan

Gulliver's Travels

Thackeray, William M.

Vanity Fair

Thoreau, Henry David

Walden

Tolstoy, Leo

Anna Karenina

War and Peace

Trollope, Anthony

Barchester Towers

Turgenev, Ivan

Fathers and Sons

Twain, Mark

Pudd'nhead Wilson

Updike, John

Rabbit Run

Vergil

The Aeneid

Voltaire

Candide

Warren, Robert Penn

All the King's Men

Waugh, Evelyn

Brideshead Revisited

A Handful of Dust

Wharton, Edith

Age of Innocence

White, T.H.

The Once and Future King

The Sword in the Stone

Wilde, Oscar

The Importance of Being Earnest

The Picture of Dorian Gray

Wilder, Thornton

Our Town

Williams, Tennessee

The Glass Menagerie

A Streetcar Named Desire

Wolfe, Thomas

Look Homeward, Angel

Woolf, Virginia

Mrs. Dalloway

To the Lighthouse

Wouk, Herman

The Caine Mutiny

Wright, Richard

Black Boy

Native Son