Robert McCrum’s two-year tour of the 100 best English-language novels has provoked a mixed response, with many readers pointing to the shortage of women and non-white writers. Let us know who you would like to see included on the list
- The 100 best novels written in English: the full list
- Robert McCrum reflects on his choices
- One in five doesn’t represent over 300 years of women in literature: a response
No Atwood. No Pynchon. No Vonnegut. No Julian Barnes, no Patricia Highsmith, no Martin Amis, no David Foster Wallace, no Chinua Achebe. We could continue. Robert McCrum’s list of the 100 best novels has already been picked over for its shortage of women, of writers of colour - even of Irish authors. It’s all in good humour, and to prolong the fun we’re inviting you to nominate the one (or several) novels that you think should absolutely have been on the list. We will publish a compilation soon on the Guardian site. Here are some examples of what readers have already said.
Most of the 'best novels' I miss are other novels by authors already on the list. By limiting the list to one book per author, McCrum is as good as admitting that this is a survey of English literature, not a best novels list. This is strengthened by the palpable sense that he's tried to include every genre --only missing fantasy. Grateful for this exclusion, as it means no Tolkien.
Speaking of Tolkein: a shame to see Amis and Rushdie on the list. They're quite unreadable, and not in the forgiveable way that, say, Ishiguro is (claustrophobic to the point of causing depression) but by having their quite unforgivable personalities so present in their books that 'quality' becomes a meaningless measure.
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