I started The 10 Year Reading Plan for the Great Books of the Western World in April 2024. I am not going in any particular order and will be picking and choosing based on what books I can locate. The books I am currently reading are in red/italicized and the ones I’ve completed are in bold.
YEAR 1
PLATO: Apology, Crito
ARISTOPHANES: Clouds, Lysistrata
PLATO: Republic [Book I-II]
ARISTOTLE: Ethics [Book I]
ARISTOTLE: Politics [Book I]
PLUTARCH: The Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans [Lycurgus, Numa Pompilius, Lycurgus and Numa Compared, Alexander, Caesar]
NEW TESTAMENT: The Gospel According to Saint Matthew, The Acts of the Apostles
ST. AUGUSTINE: Confessions [Book I-VIII]
MACHIAVELLI: The Prince
RABELAIS: Gargantua and Pantagruel [Book I-II]
MONTAIGNE: Essays [Of Custom, and That We Should Not Easily Change a Law Received; Of Pedantry; Of the Education of Children; That It Is Folly to Measure Truth and Error by Our Own Capacity; Of Cannibals; That the Relish of Good and Evil Depends in a Great Measure upon the Opinion We Have of Them; Upon Some Verses of Virgil]
SHAKESPEARE: Hamlet
LOCKE: Concerning Civil Government [Second Essay]
ROUSSEAU: The Social Contract [Book I-II]
GIBBON: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire [Ch. 15-16]
The Declaration of Independence, The Constitution of the United States, The Federalist [Numbers 1-10, 15, 31, 47, 51, 68-71]
SMITH: The Wealth of Nations [Introduction—Book I, Ch. 9]
MARX—ENGELS: Manifesto of the Communist Party
YEAR 2
HOMER: The Iliad
AESCHYLUS: Agamemnon, Choephoroe, Eumenides
SOPHOCLES: Oedipus the King, Antigone
HERODOTUS: The History [Book I-II]
PLATO: Meno
ARISTOTLE: Poetics
ARISTOTLE: Ethics [Book II; Book III, Ch. 5-12; Book VI, Ch. 8-13]
NICOMACHUS: Introduction to Arithmetic
LUCRETIUS: On the Nature of Things [Book I-IV]
MARCUS AURELIUS: Meditations
HOBBES: Leviathan [Part I]
MILTON: Areopagitica
PASCAL: Pensées [Numbers 72, 82-83, 100, 128, 131, 139, 142-143, 171, 194-195, 219, 229, 233-234, 242, 273, 277, 282, 289, 298, 303, 320, 323, 325, 330-331,374, 385, 392, 395-397, 409, 412-413, 416, 418, 425, 430, 434-435, 463, 491, 525-531, 538, 543, 547, 553, 556, 564, 571, 586, 598, 607-610, 613, 619-620, 631, 640,644, 673, 675, 684, 692-693, 737, 760, 768, 792-793] (Vol. 33, pp. 181-184, 186-189, 191-192, 195-200, 203, 205-210, 212-218, 222-225, 227, 229-232, 237-251, 255, 259, 264-275, 277-287, 290-291, 296-302, 318, 321-322, , 326-327)
PASCAL: Treatise on the Arithmetical Triangle
SWIFT: Gulliver’s Travels
ROUSSEAU: A Discourse on the Origin of Inequality
KANT: Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysic of Morals
MILL: On Liberty
YEAR 3
AESCHYLUS: Prometheus Bound
HERODOTUS: The History [Book VII-IX]
THUCYDIDES: The History of the Peloponnesian War [Book I-II, V]
PLATO: Statesman
ARISTOTLE: On Interpretation [Ch. 1-10]
ARISTOTLE: Politics [Book III-V]
EUCLID: Elements [Book I]
TACITUS: The Annals
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS: Summa Theologica [Part I-II, QQ 90-97]
CHAUCER: Troilus and Cressida
SHAKESPEARE: Macbeth
MILTON: Paradise Lost
LOCKE: An Essay Concerning Human Understanding [Book III, Ch. 1-3, 9-11]
KANT: Science of Right
MILL: Representative Government [Ch. 1-6]
LAVOISIER: Elements of Chemistry [Part I]
DOSTOEVSKY: The Brothers Karamazov [Part I-II]
FREUD: The Origin and Development of Psychoanalysis
YEAR 4
EURIPIDES: Medea, Hippolytus, Trojan Women, The Bacchantes
PLATO: Republic [Book VI-VII]
PLATO: Theaetetus
ARISTOTLE: Physics [Book IV, Ch. 1-5, 10-14]
ARISTOTLE: Metaphysics [Book I, Ch. 1-2; Book IV; Book VI, Ch. 1; Book XI, Ch. 1-4]
ST. AUGUSTINE: Confessions [Book IX-XIII]
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS: Summa Theologica [Part I, QQ 16-17, 84-88]
MONTAIGNE: Apology for Raymond de Sebonde
GALILEO: Two New Sciences [Third Day, through Scholium of Theorem II]
BACON: Novum Organum [Preface, Book I]
DESCARTES: Discourse on the Method
NEWTON: Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy [Prefaces, Definitions, Axioms, General Scholium]
LOCKE: An Essay Concerning Human Understanding [Book II]
HUME: An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
KANT: Critique of Pure Reason [Prefaces, Introduction, Transcendental Aesthetic]
MELVILLE: Moby Dick
DOSTOEVSKY: The Brothers Karamazov [Part III-IV]
JAMES: Principles of Psychology [Ch. XV, XX]
YEAR 5
PLATO: Phaedo
ARISTOTLE: Categories
ARISTOTLE: On the Soul [Book II, Ch. 1-3; Book III]
HIPPOCRATES: The Oath; On Ancient Medicine; On Airs, Waters, and Places; The Book of Prognostics; Of the Epidemics; The Law; On the Sacred Disease
GALEN: On the Natural Faculties
VIRGIL: The Aeneid
PTOLEMY: The Almagest [Book I, Ch. 1-8]
COPERNICUS: Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres [Introduction—Book I, Ch. 11]
KEPLER: Epitome of Copernican Astronomy [Book IV, Part II, Ch. 1-2]
PLOTINUS: Sixth Ennead
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS: Summa Theologica [Part I, QQ 75-76, 78-79]
DANTE: The Divine Comedy [Hell]
HARVEY: The Motion of the Heart and Blood
CERVANTES: Don Quixote [Part I]
SPINOZA: Ethics [Part II]
BERKELEY: The Principles of Human Knowledge
KANT: Critique of Pure Reason [Transcendental Analytic]
DARWIN: The Origin of Species [Introduction—Ch. 6, Ch. 15]
TOLSTOY: War and Peace [Book I-VIII]
JAMES: Principles of Psychology [Ch. XXVIII]
YEAR 6
OLD TESTAMENT [Genesis, Exodus, Deuteronomy]
HOMER: The Odyssey
PLATO: Laws [Book X]
ARISTOTLE: Metaphysics [Book XII]
TACITUS: The Histories
PLOTINUS: Fifth Ennead
ST. AUGUSTINE: The City of God [Book XV-XVIII]
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS: Summa Theologica [Part I, QQ 1-13]
DANTE: The Divine Comedy [Purgatory]
SHAKESPEARE: Comedy of Errors, The Taming of the Shrew, As You Like It, Twelfth Night
SPINOZA: Ethics [Part I]
MILTON: Samson Agonistes
PASCAL: The Provincial Letters
LOCKE: An Essay Concerning Human Understanding [Book IV]
GIBBON: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire [Ch. 1-5, General Observations on the Fall of the Roman Empire in the West]
KANT: Critique of Pure Reason [Transcendental Dialectic]
HEGEL: Philosophy of History [Introduction]
TOLSTOY: War and Peace [Book IX-XV, Epilogues]
YEAR 7
OLD TESTAMENT [Job, Isaiah, Amos]
PLATO: Symposium
PLATO: Philebus
ARISTOTLE: Ethics [Book VIII-X]
ARCHIMEDES: Measurement of a Circle, The Equilibrium of Planes [Book I], The Sand-Reckoner, On Floating Bodies [Book I]
EPICTETUS: Discourses
PLOTINUS: First Ennead
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS: Summa Theologica [Part I-II, QQ 1-5]
DANTE: The Divine Comedy [Paradise]
RABELAIS: Gargantual and Pantagruel [Book III-IV]
SHAKESPEARE: Julius Caesar, Antony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus
GALILEO: Two New Sciences [First Day]
SPINOZA: Ethics [Part IV-V]
NEWTON: Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy [Book III, Rules], Optics [Book I, Part I; Book III, Queries]
HUYGENS: Treatise on Light
KANT: Critique of Practical Reason
KANT: Critique of Judgment [Critique of Aesthetic Judgment]
MILL: Utilitarianism
YEAR 8
ARISTOPHANES: Thesmophoriazusae, Ecclesiazusae, Plutus
PLATO: Gorgias
ARISTOTLE: Ethics [Book V]
ARISTOTLE: Rhetoric [Book I, Ch. 1—Book II, Ch. 1; Book II, Ch. 20—Book III, Ch. 1; Book III, Ch. 13-19]
ST. AUGUSTINE: On Christian Doctrine
HOBBES: Leviathan [Part II]
SHAKESPEARE: Othello, King Lear
BACON: Advancement of Learning [Book I, Ch. 1—Book II, Ch. 11]
DESCARTES: Meditations on the First Philosophy
SPINOZA: Ethics [Part III]
LOCKE: A Letter Concerning Toleration
STERNE: Tristam Shandy
ROUSSEAU: A Discourse on Political Economy
ADAM SMITH: The Wealth of Nations [Book II]
BOSWELL: The Life of Samuel Johnson
MARX: Capital [Prefaces, Part I-II]
GOETHE: Faust [Part I]
JAMES: Principles of Psychology [Ch. VIII-X]
YEAR 9
PLATO: The Sophist
THUCYDIDES: The History of the Peloponnesian War [Book VII-VIII]
ARISTOTLE: Politics [Book VII-VIII]
APOLLONIUS: On Conic Sections [Book I, Prop. 1-15; Book III, Prop. 42-55]
NEW TESTAMENT [The Gospel According to St. John, The Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Romans, The First Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians]
ST. AUGUSTINE: The City of God [Book V, XIX]
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS: Summa Theologica [Part II-II, QQ 1-7]
GILBERT: On the Loadstone
DESCARTES: Rules for the Direction of the Mind
DESCARTES: Geometry
PASCAL: The Great Experiment Concerning the Equilibrium of Fluids, On Geometrical Demonstration
FIELDING: Tom Jones
MONTESQUIEU: The Spirit of Laws [Book I-V, VIII, XI-XII]
FOURIER: Analytical Theory of Heat [Preliminary Discourse, Ch. 1-2]
FARADAY: Experimental Researches in Electricity [Series I-II], A Speculation Touching Electric Conduction and the Nature of Matter
HEGEL: Philosophy of Right [Part III]
MARX: Capital [Part III-IV]
FREUD: Civilization and Its Discontents
YEAR 10
SOPHOCLES: Ajax, Electra
PLATO: Timaeus
ARISTOTLE: On the Parts of Animals [Book I, Ch. 1—Book II, Ch. 1], On the Generation of Animals [Book I, Ch. 1, 17-18, 20-23]
LUCRETIUS: On the Nature of Things [Book V-VI]
VIRGIL: The Eclogues, The Georgics
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS: Summa Theologica [Part I, QQ 65-74]
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS: Summa Theologica [Part I, QQ 90-102]
CHAUCER: Canterbury Tales [Prologue, Knight’s Tale, Miller’s Prologue and Tale, Reeve’s Prologue and Tale, Wife of Bath’s Prologue and Tale, Friar’s Prologue and Tale, Summoner’s Prologue and Tale, Pardoner’s Prologue and Tale]
SHAKESPEARE: The Tragedy of King Richard II, The First Part of King Henry IV, The Second Part of King Henry IV, The Life of King Henry V
HARVEY: On the Generation of Animals [Introduction—Exercise 62]
CERVANTES: Don Quixote [Part II]
KANT: Critique of Judgement [Critique of Teleological Judgement]
BOSWELL: The Life of Samuel Johnson
GOETHE: Faust [Part II]
DARWIN: The Descent of Man [Part I; Part III, Ch. 21]
MARX: Capital [Part VII-VIII]
JAMES: Principles of Psychology [Ch. I, V-VII]
FREUD: A General Introduction to Psycho-analysis