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A Century of Reading: The 10 Books That Defined the 1920s

Part three of your new favorite series.

Some books are flashes in the pan, read for entertainment and then left on a bus seat for the next lucky person to pick up and enjoy, forgotten by most after their season has passed. Others stick around, are read and re-read, are taught and discussed. sometimes due to great artistry, sometimes due to luck, and sometimes because they manage to recognize and capture some element of the culture of the time.

In the moment, you often can’t tell which books are which.  The Great Gatsby  wasn’t a bestseller upon its release, but we now see it as emblematic of a certain American sensibility in the 1920s. Of course, hindsight can also distort the senses; the canon looms and obscures. Still, over the next weeks, we’ll be publishing a list a day, each one attempting to define a discrete decade, starting with the 1900s (as you’ve no doubt guessed by now) and counting down until we get to the (nearly complete) 2010s.

Though the books on these lists need not be American in origin, I am looking for books that evoke some aspect of American life, actual or intellectual, in each decade—a global lens would require a much longer list. And of course, varied and complex as it is, there’s no list that could truly define American life over ten or any number of years, so I do not make any claim on exhaustiveness. I’ve simply selected books that, if read together, would give a fair picture of the landscape of literary culture for that decade—both as it was and as it is remembered. Finally, two process notes: I’ve limited myself to one book for author over the entire 12-part list, so you may see certain works skipped over in favor of others, even if both are important (for instance, I ignored  Dubliners  yesterday so I could include Ulysses  today), and in the case of translated work, I’ll be using the date of the English translation, for obvious reasons.

For our third installment, below you’ll find 10 books that defined the third decade of the 1900s—a decade that, as you may notice, the literary world is still particularly obsessed with.

Christie’s first published novel—and the first to feature her mega-famous creation Hercule Poirot—was released to wide acclaim (somewhat surprised acclaim, considering it was a first novel by an unknown) in 1920, helping to usher in the Golden Age of Detective Fiction, not to mention the enduring love affair that millions of fans would have with Christie’s work. According to the flap copy of the first edition, Christie wrote it after accepting a bet—that she couldn’t write a mystery novel in which the reader could spot the murderer before the detective. Everyone agrees that she won. Now she’s one of the best selling, widely translated, and most influential novelists of all time—but it all started here.

Eliot’s masterpiece is widely considered to be one of the most important works of Modernist literature, not to mention 20th-century literature in general. The book-length poem, which Louis Menand describes as “a collage of allusion, quotation, echo, appropriation, pastiche, imitation, and ventriloquism,” but also “a report on the condition of postwar Europe,” didn’t sell particularly well (330 copies in the first six months), but the Cambridge academics seized upon it, and with Eliot’s other works, used it as the basis for creating the modern English department.

If we’re counting by literary influence, Ulysses  was biggest book of the 20s by far—the most important Modernist text and certainly one of the most important novels ever written. “ Ulysses ,” T. S. Eliot told Virginia Woolf , “destroyed the whole of the 19th century. It left Joyce himself with nothing to write another book on. It showed up the futility of all the English styles.” For her part, Woolf wasn’t always convinced, but did sing its praises in her essay “ Modern Fiction ,” calling it “undeniably important . . . The scene in the cemetery, for instance, with its brilliancy, its sordidity, its incoherence, its sudden lightning flashes of significance, does undoubtedly come so close to the quick of the mind that, on a first reading at any rate, it is difficult not to acclaim a masterpiece. If we want life itself, here surely we have it.”

If any book could challenge  Ulysses  for the top spot in literary history, it’s Proust’s seven-volume masterpiece about memory,  In Search of Lost Time , the first book of which was translated by C. K. Scott Moncrieff and published in English for the first time in 1922. In fact, in 2013 Edmund White called it “the most respected novel of the 20th century,” and noted that “in the last 30 years Proust has superseded Joyce.” Either way, like  Ulysses , it is a widely influential, much-discussed, probably under-read, classic exemplar of the decade in literature, a text that reverberates through to much of our art today.

Yet another Modernist masterpiece for this list, this one also a significant text of the Harlem Renaissance, notable for its experimental style, which blends poetry, prose, and drama to illuminate the lives of African Americans living under Jim Crow. Though it received positive—if sometimes baffled—reviews from contemporary critics, the book did not find widespread success in the decade of its publication. “The Negro artist works against an undertow of sharp criticism and misunderstanding from his own group and unintentional bribes from the whites,” wrote Langston Hughes in his 1926 essay “ The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain .”

“Oh, be respectable, write about nice people, show how good we are,” say the Negroes. “Be stereotyped, don’t go too far, don’t shatter our illusions about you, don’t amuse us too seriously. We will pay you,” say the whites. Both would have told Jean Toomer not to write Cane . The colored people did not praise it. The white people did not buy it. Most of the colored people who did read Cane hate it. They are afraid of it. Although the critics gave it good reviews the public remained indifferent. Yet (excepting the work of Du Bois) Cane contains the finest prose written by a Negro in America. And like the singing of Robeson, it is truly racial.

Now it’s considered one of the most important books of the Harlem Renaissance, and a Modernist classic, particularly notable for its formal flexibility and enduring influence on later works.

Given its enduring cultural relevance, it’s impossible to ignore this Great American Novel, and its influence on the way we imagine the 1920s in this country, despite the fact that in the actual 1920s, it wasn’t considered so great. Sure, readers loved This Side of Paradise  and  The Beautiful and the Damned , but  The Great Gatsby  represented something of a fall from grace. “Fitzgerald’s Latest A Dud” read the headline of a review in the  New York World . Other reviewers were less critical but unenthusiastic, and by the time Fitzgerald died in 1940, the book had sold fewer than 25,000 copies. Now it sells 500,000 copies a year, if mostly to disgruntled students. It was WWII that rescued Gatsby from obscurity. The US government developed a program to send cheap paperback books to soldiers, and of the 1,227 titles chosen, one of them was The Great Gatsby . The program was wildly popular— by some estimates more than a million soldiers read the novel—and Fitzgerald’s reputation soared. It hasn’t slowed down yet.

You could argue (or at least I would) that  To the Lighthouse  (1927) is the more formally exciting—and even the better—book, that Orlando  (1928) is decidedly more fun, and that  A Room of One’s Own (1929) is the most widely and continually influential (or at least glibly quoted) but I think it’s safe to say that  Mrs. Dalloway  is the most loved. At least, that’s my read after surveying the Literary Hub office, the internet, and the members of my own personal family. It was also very well regarded in its time—in a contemporary review in the New York Times , John W. Crawford wrote:

Among Mrs. Woolf’s contemporaries, there are not a few who have brought to the traditional forms of fiction, and the stated modes of writing, idioms which cannot but enlarge the resources of speech and the uses of narrative. Virginia Woolf is almost alone, however, in the intricate yet clear art of her composition. . . . Clarissa is . . . conceived so brilliantly, dimensioned so thoroughly and documented so absolutely that her type, in the words of Constantin Stanislavsky, might be said to have been done ”inviolably and for all time.”

Despite all the competition, Mrs. Dalloway  is a standout work in a standout career, a hallmark of the Modernist movement, and a splendid, wrenching, subtle psychological novel, beloved in its day and beloved now.

The title poem of Langston Hughes’ first collection is still one of his most famous, weaving language and jazz together as in all the best of his work, and he’s probably the most important figure of the Harlem Renaissance. “It’s the poems that speak of being “Black like me”— black  still being fighting words in some quarters—that prove especially moving,” wrote Kevin Young in an introduction to a 2014 edition of the book.

Hughes manages remarkably to take Whitman’s American “I” and write himself into it. After labeling the final section “Our Land,” the volume ends with one of the more memorable lines of the century, almost an anthem: “I, too, am America.”

Offering up a series of “Dream Variations,” as one section is called, Hughes, it becomes clear, is celebrating, critiquing, and completing the American dream, that desire for equality or at least opportunity. But his America takes in the Americas—including Mexico, where his estranged father moved to flee the color line of the United States—and even the West Coast of Africa, which he’d also visited. His well-paced poetry is laced with an impeccable exile.

A groundbreaking collection from an iconic American artist.

Hemingway’s outsize influence and literary fame began with the publication of  The Sun Also Rises , his first proper novel, and hasn’t abated much in the 90 years since. “No amount of analysis can convey the quality of The Sun Also Rises ,” the New York Times purred in the year of its release.

It is a truly gripping story, told in a lean, hard, athletic narrative prose that puts more literary English to shame. Mr. Hemingway knows how not only to make words be specific but how to arrange a collection of words which shall betray a great deal more than is to be found in the individual parts. It is magnificent writing, filled with that organic action which gives a compelling picture of character. This novel is unquestionably one of the events of an unusually rich year in literature.

In the years after, some writers would diligently copy his sparse, “athletic” prose, and others would fly descriptively in the opposite direction, but almost everyone would develop an opinion on him, and at least some degree of knowledge of him. He’s still, decades after his death, as beloved a literary celebrity as he was during his lifetime.

We’ll round out this gutting (for me—I’ve had to cut so many!) list of literary giants with everyone’s least favorite postman , whose stream-of-consciousness masterpiece is one of the most difficult, important, complex, and lionized works of American literature—our best, not-so-humble contribution to the High Modernist era. Faulkner won the 1949 Nobel Prize for Literature for “his powerful and artistically unique contribution to the modern American novel.”

See also:  D. H. Lawrence, Women in Love (1920), Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence (1920), F. Scott Fitzgerald, This Side of Paradise (1920), Sinclair Lewis, Main Street (1920), Albert Einstein, The Meaning of Relativity (1922), Emily Post, Etiquette (1922), F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Beautiful and the Damned (1922), Katherine Mansfield, The Garden Party (1922), Margery Williams, The Velveteen Rabbit (1922), William Carlos Williams, Spring and All (1923), Carrie Chapman Catt and Nettie Rogers Shuler, Woman Suffrage and Politics: The Inner Story of the Suffrage Movement (1923), Robert Frost, New Hampshire (1923), Emma Goldman, My Disillusionment with Russia (1924), Thomas Mann, The Magic Mountain (1924), E. M. Forster,  A Passage to India (1924), Herman Melville, Billy Budd, Sailor (1924), Theodore Dreiser, An American Tragedy (1925), Alain Locke, ed., The New Negro (1925), Anita Loos, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1925), A. A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh (1926), Thornton Wilder, Bridge of San Luis Rey (1927), Willa Cather, Death Comes for the Archbishop (1927), Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse (1927), Virginia Woolf, Orlando  (1928), Aldous Huxley, Point Counter Point (1928), Evelyn Waugh, Decline and Fall (1928), Dashiell Hammett, Red Harvest (1929), Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own (1929), Thomas Wolfe, Look Homeward, Angel (1929), Henry Green, Living (1929), Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms (1929),  Erich Maria Remarque,  All Quiet on the Western Front (1929), Nella Larsen, Passing (1929), etc.

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The 51 Best Books From and About the 1920’s

“What are the best 1920’s books?” We consulted 12 articles and 378 books to answer that very question. Below you will find our results of the 51 top books from and about the 1920’s of all-time. Click here to see the methodology used.

Info That can be Found in a Best 1920’s Book Listicle

• A single woman on the book cover
• Sinclare Lewis

Editor’s Pick: One Summer by Bill Bryson

Learn More / Buy

51.) A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway

Appears on : 2 Learn More / Buy

50.) A Passage to India by E.M. Forster

49.) A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf

48.) All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque

47.) Gentlemen Prefer Blondes by Anita Loos

46.) Just William by Richmal Crompton

45.) Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D.H. Lawrence

44.) Look Homeward, Angel by Thomas Wolfe

43.) Main Street by Sinclair Lewis

42.) Manhattan Transfer by Dos Passos

41.) Mein Kampf by A Huge Asshole

40.) Mother India

39.) Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf

38.) Only Yesterday by Frederick Lewis Allen

37.) Our Times: The United States, 1900-1925 by Mark Sullivan

36.) Point Counter Point by Aldous Huxley

35.) So Big by Edna Ferber

34.) Strange Interlude by Eugene O’Neill

33.) The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton

32.) The Boston Cooking School Cook Book

31.) The Castle by Franz Kafka

30.) The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim

29.) The Enormous Room by E.E.Cummings

28.) The Home-Maker

27.) The Making of Americans by Gertrude Stein

26.) The Man Nobody Knows by Bruce Barton

25.) The Mind in the Making

24.) The New Negro by Alain Locke

23.) The Outline of History by Herbert George Wells

22.) The Story of Doctor Dolittle by Hugh Lofting

21.) The Trial by Franz Kafka

20.) The Weary Blues by Langston Hughes

19.) To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf

18.) Twilight Sleep by Edith Wharton

17.) Ulysses by James Joyce

16.) We by Yevgeny Zamyatin

15.) Winnie the Pooh by A.A. Milne

14.) Women in Love by D.H. Lawrence

13.) Dave at Night by Gail Carson Levine

12.) Harlem Stomp!: a cultural history of the Harlem Renaissance by Laban Carrick Hill

11.) Harlem Summer by Walter Dean Myers

10.) Henry and the Kite Dragon By Bruce Edward Hall

9.) Elmer Gantry  by Sinclair Lewis

Appears on : 3 Learn More / Buy

8.) The Americanization of Edward Bok by Edward William Bok

7.) The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner

6.) The Waste Land by T.S. Eliot

5.) This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald

4.) Witness By Karen Hesse

3.) The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Appears on : 4 Learn More / Buy

2.) Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis

Appears on : 5 Learn More / Buy

1.) The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

The 327 Other 1920’s Books Appearing on a Single List

• A Dictionary of Twentieth-Century World History – Jan Palmowski
• A Gentleman of Courage
• A Good Woman
• A High Wind in Jamaica
• A Man from Maine
• A Poor Wise Man
• A Preface to Morals
• Absentee Ownership
• Accelerated Grimace: Expressionism in the American Drama of the 1920sBy Mardi Valgemae
• After Wilson: The Struggle for the Democratic Party, 1920-1934By Douglas B. Craig
• Age of Innocence
• All Kneeling
• Almanacs of American Life: Modern America 1914 to 1945 – Gregory, Ross
• America in the 1920s. (The Decades of Twentieth-Century America Series
• American Culture in the 1920sBy Susan Currell
• American Decades – Layman, Richard
• An American Idyll
• An American Tragedy
• An Emerging World Power, 1900-1929
• An Ocean Apart, a World Away
• An Old-fashioned ABC Book By: Elizabeth Allen Ashton
• Anatole France Himself
• Ask Me Another
• Aspects of the Novel
• Asylum – William Seabrook
• Auction Bridge Complete
• Autobiography of Mark Twain
• Beau Sabreur
• Becoming Babe Ruth
• Being and Time
• Believe It or Not
• Beyond the Pleasure Principle by Sigmund Freud
• Big Blonde and Other Stories by Dorothy Parker
• Billy Budd (posthumous)
• Bliss by Katherine Mansfield
• Bootleg: Murder, Moonshine, and the Lawless Years of Prohibition.
• Bridge of San Luis Rey
• Call It Sleep – Henry Roth
• Celeste’s Harlem Renaissance
• Cheri by Colette
• Choosing Up Sides
• Citizen Klansmen: The Ku Klux Klan in Indiana, 1921-1928By Leonard J. Moore
• Civilization in the United States
• Claire Ambler
• Collected Legal Papers
• Coming of Age in Samoa
• Conditioned Reflexes
• Cornhuskers – Carl Sandburg
• Count Luckner, the Sea Devil
• Daily Life in the United States, 1920-1939: Decades of Promise and PainBy David E. Kyvig
• Dance Marathons: Performing American Culture of the 1920s and 1930sBy Carol Martin
• Dancing Fools and Weary Blues: The Great Escape of the TwentiesBy Lawrence R. Broer; John D. Walther
• Dark Hester
• Dear Mr. Rosenwald
• Death Comes for the Archbishop
• Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh
• Does Prohibition Work? – Martha Bensley Bruere
• Duke Ellington, the Piano Prince and His Orchestra
• Dusty Answer by Rosamond Lehmann
• Egyptology: search for the tomb of Osiris, being the journal of Miss Emily Sands, November 1926 By: Emily Sands
• Elizabeth and Essex
• Ella’s Big Chance: A Jazz Age Cinderella.
• Emil and the Detectives
• Emily of New Moon
• Emma Goldman, My Disillusionment with Russia
• Encyclopedia of the United States in the Twentieth Century – Kutler, Stanley I.
• Every Man a Speculator: A History of Wall Street in American Life Steve Fraser
• Everybody Was So Young – Amanda Vaill
• Exile’s Return: A Literary Odyssey of the 1920sBy Malcolm Cowley; Donald W. Faulkner
• Experience and Nature
• Fabulous Fashions of the 1920s
• Flappers and the New American Woman: Perceptions of Women from 1918 through the 1920s
• Flight: The Journey of Charles Lindbergh
• Gentle Julia
• Glorious Apollo
• Good-bye to All That
• Greenwood Encyclopedia of Daily Life in America – Francis J. Sicius
• Harriet and the Piper
• Helen of the Old House
• Henry the Eighth
• Her Father’s Daughter
• His Children’s Children
• History and Class Consciousness
• How it Happened in Peach Hill By: Marthe Jocelyn
• Hugh Selwyn Mauberley by Ezra Pound
• Ideology and Utopia
• If Winter Comes
• In Our Time – Ernest Hemingway
• In the American Grain
• Introduction to the Science of Society
• Jazz Age: People and PerspectivesBy Mitchell Newton-Matza
• Jean Piaget, Judgment and Reasoning in the Child
• Jefferson and Hamilton
• Joe-Joe’s First Flight
• John Brown’s Body
• Joseph and His Brethren
• Keep Your Eye on the Kid: The Early Years of Buster Keaton. illus. by author.
• Kindred of the Dust
• Law, Alcohol, and Order: Perspectives on National ProhibitionBy David E. Kyvig
• Les Enfants Terribles by Jean Cocteau
• Living Well Is the Best Revenge – Calvin Tomkins
• Lost Ecstasy
• Main Currents in American Thought
• Mamba’s Daughters
• Marcel Mauss, The Gift
• Maria Chapdelaine
• Mark Twain’s Autobiography
• Middlesex By: Jeffrey Eugenides
• Miracles And Modern Spiritualism –Alfred Russel Wallace
• Mirrors of Washington
• Mistress Wilding
• Modern Temper
• Mr. Fortune’s Maggot by Sylvia Townsend Warner
• Nadja by Andre Breton
• Nature of the Physical World
• New Aspects of Politics
• New Hampshire
• New World Coming By: Nathan Miller
• Notes on Democracy
• Now It Can Be Told
• Of Time And The River – Thomas Wolfe
• One Increasing Purpose
• Operation Red Jericho By: Joshua Mowll
• Outwitting Our Nerves
• Over Here: The First World War and American Society David M. Kennedy
• Paint By Magic
• Painted Windows
• Parade’s End
• Peace Negotiations
• Peder Victorious
• Public Opinion
• Queen Victoria
• Quest for Certainty
• Reconstruction in Philosophy
• Religion and the Rise of Capitalism
• Revolt in the Desert
• Romancero Gitano by Federico Garcia Lorca
• Roosevelt’s Letters to His Children
• Roper’s Row
• Scarlet Sister Mary
• Science and Poetry
• Science and the Modern World
• Self-Mastery Through Conscious Auto-Suggestion
• Shailer Mathews, Faith of Modernism
• Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse
• Simon Called Peter
• Sir Charlie: Chaplin, the Funniest Man in the World
• Six Characters in Search of an Author
• Six Days in October: The Stock Market Crash of 1929
• Smoke And Steel – Carl Sandburg
• Social Change
• Sorrell and Son
• Spoon River Anthology – Edgar Lee Masters
• Structures of the Jazz Age: Mass Culture, Progressive Education, and Racial Discourse in American Modernism By Chip Rhodes
• Studies in Classic American Literature
• Summer for the Gods: The Scopes Trial and America’s Continuing Debate Over Science and Religion
• Taft, Holmes, and the 1920s Court: An AppraisalBy David H. Burton
• Temperance Or Prohibition – Francis J. Teitsort ed.
• Tender Is The Night – F. Scott Fitzgerald
• The 1920s Decade in Photos: The Roaring Twenties
• The 1920s: From Prohibition to Charles Lindbergh
• The 1920s: Luck By: Dorothy Hoobler
• The Argonauts of the Western Pacific
• The Art of Thinking
• The Autobiography of Margot Asquith
• The Beautiful and the Damned by F. Scott Fitzgerald
• The Big Town – Ring Lardner
• The Bishop Murder Case
• The Blue Window
• The Book Nobody Knows
• The Boxcar Children
• The Boy Who Invented TV: The Story of Philo Farnsworth
• The Breaking Point
• The Bridge of San Luis Rey
• The Brimming Cup
• The Call of the Canyon
• The Carolinian
• The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle
• The Children of Odin: The Book of Northern Myths
• The Coast of Folly
• The Color Purple By: Alice Walker
• The Concept of the Political
• The Constant Nymph
• The Cradle of the Deep
• The Crisis of Parliamentary Democracy
• The Cross Word Puzzle Books
• The Decline of the West, vol. 2
• The Dim Lantern
• The Dollar Decade: Mammon and the Machine in 1920s AmericaBy Gary Dean Best
• The Economic Consequences of the Peace
• The Frontier in American History
• The Gangs of New York by Herbert Asbury
• The Glorious Adventure
• The Golden Day
• The Good Earth By: Pearl S. Buck
• The Great Impersonation
• The Green Hat
• The Greene Murder Case
• The Head of the House of Coombe
• The Heart of a Dog by Mikhail Bulgakov
• The Heirs Apparent
• The Hounds of Spring
• The Hours By: Michael Cunningham
• The House By: Danielle Steel
• The Inimitable Jeeves by P.G Wodehouse
• The Intelligent Woman’s Guide to Socialism and Capitalism
• The Kat Who Walked in Beauty: the panoramic dailies of 1920 By: George Herriman
• The Keeper of the Bees
• The Kingdom Round the Corner
• The Lamp in the Desert
• The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page
• The Light of Faith
• The Little French Girl
• The Little Match Girl By: Jerry Pinkney
• The Logic of Modern Physics
• The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann
• The Magical Land of Noom
• The Man of the Forest
• The Mansions of Philosophy
• The Meaning of Relativity
• The Middle Border – Hamlin Garland
• The Midlander
• The Midnight Folk
• The Milly-Molly-Mandy Storybook.
• The Mine with the Iron Door
• The Mirrors of Downing Street
• The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie
• The Mysterious Rider
• The New Decalogue of Science
• The Night Owls
• The Old Countess
• The Outline of Science
• The Painted Veil by W. Somerset Maugham
• The People, Yes – Carl Sandburg
• The Perennial Bachelor
• The Plastic Age
• The Plutocrat
• The Portygee
• The Private Life of Helen of Troy
• The Prophet
• The Public and Its Problems
• The Re-Creation of Brian Kent
• The Revolt of the Masses
• The Ring Lardner Reader – Ring Lardner
• The Rise of American Civilization
• The River’s End
• The Royal Road to Romance
• The Scopes Trial: Faith, Science, and American Education
• The Sea-Hawk
• The Silver Spoon
• The Sisters-in-Law
• The Specialist
• The Star Fisher By: Laurence Yep
• The Story of Mankind
• The Story of My Experiments with Truth
• The Story of Philosophy
• The Strange Case of Miss Annie Spragg
• The Timetables of History – Grun, Bernard
• The Tragic Era
• The Trial of Sacco and Vanzetti: A Primary Source Account
• The Trumpeter of Krakow
• The Twenties – Edmund Wilson
• The Twenties in America: Politics and HistoryBy Niall Palmer
• The Valley of Silent Men
• The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams
• The Voice that Challenged a Nation By: Russell Freedman
• The Wanderer of the Wasteland
• Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
• Theodore Roosevelt
• They Came Like Swallows – William Maxwell
• They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? – Horace McCoy
• Thirty Years Among The Dead – Carl Wickland M.D.
• This Freedom
• This Land is your Land By: Woody Guthrie
• Thomas Mann, The Magic Mountain
• Three Across: The Great Atlantic Air Race of 1927
• Tinkers By: Paul Harding
• Tintin in the Land of the Soviets by Herge
• To the Last Man
• Tobacco Road – Erskine Caldwell
• Tomorrow Morning
• Towards a New Architecture
• Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
• Trader Horn, vol. 1
• Twentieth-Century Teen Culture by the Decades: A Reference GuideBy Lucy Rollin
• Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair by Pablo Neruda
• Twenty-Five Years
• Twice Thirty
• U.S.A. – John Dos Passos
• Uncle Jed’s Barbershop By: Margaree King Mitchell
• Vixen By: Jillian Larkin
• When We Were Very Young
• White Lilacs By: Carolyn Meyer
• White Shadows in the South Seas
• Why I Am Not a Christian
• Why We Behave Like Human Beings
• Winesburg, Ohio – Sherwood Anderson
• Wintersmoon
• With Courage and Cloth: Winning the Fight for a Woman’s Right to Vote.
• Woman Suffrage and Politics
• Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze By: Elizabeth Foreman Lewis

Article Sources Arranged by Publish Date

• 2009: Books For Teens – Historical Fiction: 1920s 
• 4/19/2012: BookRiot – My 1920s Reading List 
• 6/5/2012: Sewickley Library – The 1920s – Books for All-Ages
• 9/24/2012: What Do We Do All Day – 10 Children’s Classics: 1920’s
• 3/19/2013: School Library Journal – The 1920’s: The Decade That Roared 
• 10/20/2013: NPR – Prohibition-Era Passion: Three ’20s Books On Trailblazing Loves 
• 9/17/2015: Lib Guides – 1920s Books & Sites 
• Stylist – 50 Best books of the 1920s 
• OCF Berkeley – The Books of the Century: 1920-1929 
• Shmoop – The 1920s Books 
• 1920-30 – 1920’s Literature – Books That Define This Period 
• Questia – 1920’s America

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20 books that defined the 1920s

In a new series, we look at the novels that helped shape our past, from famous classics to forgotten gems. To kick things off, here's to the roaring 1920s...

Every now and then, a novel captures its era so perfectly that it becomes a window through which future generations can peer into its world. In this new series, we are taking a look at the fiction that helped define the decades in which they came out. They aren't always bestsellers – some require time and distance to prove their epoch-defining credentials – but all have come to play a part in shaping our perspectives its time and place.

We're starting with the 1920s, one of the 20 th century's most dynamic decades. The world was coming out of a devastating war, a new kind of capitalism was rearing its head, and many writers saw an opportunity to express their disillusionment with societal isssues such as racism  present. For others, it was a fresh chance to celebrate sexual liberation, or the pursuit of pleasure that engendered the Jazz Age. 

So, without further ado, here are 20 books, each of which played some part in defining the roaring 20s.

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The Rise and Fall of a Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan

In a new book, Timothy Egan traces the Klan’s expansion in the 1920s across American political and civic life. Then its leader, David C. Stephenson, committed murder.

By Jeff Shesol

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A FEVER IN THE HEARTLAND: The Ku Klux Klan’s Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them , by Timothy Egan

The scene, in some ways, could not have been more commonplace. On July 4, 1923, in a creekside park in Kokomo, Ind., families celebrated Independence Day with flags and bunting, watermelon and pie, patriotic songs, a parade. Commonplace — except that these families, many thousands in number, wore the white hoods and robes of the Ku Klux Klan. Banners insisted that “America is for Americans”; floats portrayed Klansmen defending women from Black people and Catholics. As the day’s featured speaker — David C. Stephenson, Grand Dragon of the Realm of Indiana — stepped out of the rear cockpit of a Klan-branded biplane, members of the crowd dropped to their knees and, in rapture, reached out their arms. “My worthy subjects,” Stephenson exulted.

D.C. Stephenson, the central figure in the Klan’s expansion across the American Midwest of the 1920s, its chokehold on civic life and political power, and its ultimate collapse, is the focus of “A Fever in the Heartland,” a powerful new book by Timothy Egan. The Grand Dragon’s tale is not untold: Over the past century it has attracted both scholarly and lurid interest. But Egan, the former New York Times columnist whose 2006 book on the Dust Bowl, “The Worst Hard Time,” won a National Book Award, writes with brisk authority and an eye for the vivid, and unsettling, detail. There are many in this book, which reads at times like a screenplay for a crime procedural, at others like a horror film.

The 1920s marked what the historian Linda Gordon, in an excellent book on the subject, calls “the second coming of the K.K.K.” The new Klan drew on the same deep reservoir of racial animus, the same mythology of white victimhood, as its 19th-century antecedent. Its methods, too, had their roots in the Reconstruction era: torture, beatings, lynchings. But the second Klan sought, and to an astonishing degree achieved, an appeal beyond the Old Confederacy. It offered a more expansive set of resentments, providing more points of entry for aggrieved white Protestants. Racial purists were armed with the so-called science of eugenics and stoked with fears of being replaced by “insane, diseased” Catholics and Jews. Moral purists and traditionalists were called from the pulpit to wage war against modernity — enlisting in K.K.K. vice squads that beat adulterers and smashed up speakeasies.

But the Klan did more, in this period, than raise the fiery cross. For a startlingly large number of Americans, Egan writes, the Klan “gave meaning, shape and purpose to the days.” It was possible to do your shopping at Klan-approved stores and cook Klan-approved recipes, to enroll your sons in the Junior K.K.K. and daughters in the Tri-K Klub, and to spend evenings singing Klan songs by the piano. The K.K.K., in later parlance, was an ecosystem. “Folks got their news from editors loyal to the Klan,” Egan explains, or from a disinformation network that spread lies with speed. Corruption kept the enterprise running and growing: The police and politicians were bribed; businesses owned by Jews, Catholics or Blacks were shaken down; leaders and recruiters — including pastors — got a cut of initiation fees, dues and robe sales.

In Indiana the Klan found its fullest expression: its largest membership rolls, its greatest influence on civic life. “The Klan owned the state,” Egan observes, “and Stephenson owned the Klan.” Stephenson was an early-20th-century type: a malign Harold Hill, a man of uncertain origin and sinister charm who grifted his way from town to town, his eye on the main chance. Egan charts his ascension from a street-corner “gasbag” into a demagogue of the first order. He studied Mussolini’s speeches and described himself as the world’s “foremost mass psychologist”: He understood what made people hate. Less than two years after donning the hood and robe, Stephenson controlled the Klan in 21 states. He ruled from an office that featured, on his desk, seven black telephones and a white one — a direct line, he claimed, to the president of the United States, a title he expected to hold someday.

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More Than 30 Books from the 1920s Readers Still Love Today

This post may contain affiliate links, which means I’ll receive a commission if you purchase through my link, at no extra cost to you. Please read full disclosure  here .

Women were fighting for the right to vote, drinking alcohol was against the law, the Scopes trial debated whether or not evolution should be taught in the classroom, Charles Lindbergh flew nonstop from New York to Paris, the stock market crashed, and these are the books they were reading.

One of the themes I noticed about this decade is how many of them detail life during or after World War I and the effect it had on society. It goes to show how far and wide the impact that war had on that decade. Little did they know that a much bigger war was looming on the horizon.

The books on this list cover many genres, including mystery, historical fiction, fantasy, philosophy, religion, and social commentary.

There are also several children’s classics. If you don’t know where to start or which book to read first, I recommend starting with a children’s classic, and this decade has some of my personal faves.

This post is all about the 1920s book that readers still read and love today plus the bestsellers from that decade.

1920s Books We Still Love Today

The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie (1920)

In Christie’s debut novel, we meet Hercule Poirot, a Belgian refugee turned detective, who investigates the poisoning of wealthy Emily Inglethorp at Styles Court. The case is filled with red herrings, family secrets, and an ingenious use of a will. This is a great place to start if you’ve never read a Hercule Poirot Agatha Christie novel.

• Length: 185 pages
• Genre: Mystery
• Publication Year: 1920

The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton (1921)

Set in the 1870s New York high society, the novel explores the conflict between individual desires and social expectations through the story of Newland Archer, who is torn between his duty to his fiancée May Welland, and his passion for the scandalous Countess Ellen Olenska. Great for fans of Jane Austen.

• Length: 544 pages (including annotations); the novel itself is about 300 pages
• Genre: Historical fiction about 1870s New York
• Publication Year: 1921

The Story of Doctor Dolittle by Hugh Lofting (1920)

The Story of Doctor Dolittle is about Dr. John Dolittle, a kind-hearted physician from the English village of Puddleby-on-the-Marsh, who learns to communicate with animals and becomes a veterinarian. His newfound skill leads him on various adventures, including a journey to Africa to save monkeys from a deadly disease. This is a great book to share with your kids.

• Length: 176 pages
• Genre: Children’s Classic

The Doom That Came to Sarnath by H. P. Lovecraft (1920)

This short story is about the rise and fall of the fictional city of Sarnath, located near the ancient and mysterious city of Ib, inhabited by a strange race of beings. Centuries after Sarnath’s inhabitants destroy Ib and its peculiar denizens, a mysterious doom befalls Sarnath, leaving it abandoned and haunted as a testament to the curse of the destroyed beings of Ib. Great pick for fans of fantasy.

• Length: 208 pages
• Genre: Fantasy

Scaramouche by Rafael Sabatini (1920)

In this swashbuckling adventure, André-Louis Moreau, a young lawyer of unknown parentage, becomes a revolutionary during the French Revolution after his best friend is killed in a duel by an aristocrat. Driven by his quest for justice and revenge, Moreau adopts various personas, including that of a theatrical scaramouche, and becomes embroiled in the political tumult of the era, navigating through a series of romantic, legal, and martial escapades.

• Length: 418 pages
• Genre: Historical fiction about the French Revolution

Rilla of Ingleside by Lucy Maud Montgomery (1921)

This novel, the last in the Anne of Green Gables series, focuses on Anne’s youngest daughter, Rilla, during World War I, capturing the impact of the war on the Canadian home front and Rilla’s personal growth from a carefree teenager to a responsible adult. If you love Anne of Green Gables, be sure to check out my guide to the entire series here .

• Length: 318 pages
• Genre: Historical Fiction

Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse (1922)

Siddhartha is a novel that follows the journey of a young man named Siddhartha in ancient India as he seeks spiritual enlightenment and understanding, moving through various stages of life from asceticism to worldly pleasures and finally to a simple life by a river. Throughout his journey, Siddhartha learns that true enlightenment comes from within and through direct experiences of the world, leading to his ultimate realization of peace and harmony with the universe.

• Genre: Philosophy/Spirituality Fiction
• Publication Year: 1922

Ulysses by James Joyce (1922)

Ulysses is a complex novel set in Dublin on June 16, 1904, that chronicles the day-long adventures of Leopold Bloom and Stephen Dedalus, employing a myriad of literary styles to explore its characters’ inner thoughts and interactions. The novel is renowned for its stream-of-consciousness technique, rich symbolism, and deep exploration of human consciousness, effectively capturing the mundane and profound aspects of everyday life.

• Length: 736 pages
• Genre: Irish Literature

The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams (1922)

The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams is a tale about a stuffed rabbit and its journey to becoming real through the love of its owner, a young boy. The rabbit learns about love’s transformative power and the true meaning of becoming “real” when it is loved so much that it begins to wear out, ultimately leading to its magical transformation by the nursery magic Fairy.

• Length: 33 pages

The Waste Land by T. S. Elliot (1922)

The Waste Land is a poem that explores the disillusionment and despair of the post-World War I era through a series of interconnected images and historical references. It weaves together themes of desolation, spiritual dryness, and the quest for renewal in a modern world devoid of coherent cultural or religious values, ultimately suggesting the possibility of personal and societal regeneration.

• Length: 96 pages
• Genre: Poetry

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button by F. Scott Fitzgerald (1922)

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button tells the story of Benjamin Button, who was born as an elderly man in Baltimore in 1860 and ages in reverse, becoming younger as the years pass. This unique condition brings Benjamin experiences and challenges that are at odds with the society around him, leading to a life filled with paradoxes and a sense of isolation as his physical and emotional worlds move in opposite directions.

• Length: 464 pages
• Genre: Fantasy, Magical Realism

Babbit by Sinclair Lewis (1922)

Babbitt is a satirical novel that scrutinizes the life of George F. Babbitt, a prosperous but complacent real estate agent in the fictional Midwestern city of Zenith, who becomes increasingly dissatisfied with the materialism, social conformity, and hollow existence of the American middle class during the 1920s. The story captures Babbitt’s struggles with his desire for social status and respectability, juxtaposed against his longing for freedom and authenticity, ultimately highlighting the tension between individuality and societal expectations. This book was very controversial in its day.

• Length: 368 pages
• Genre: Satirical Fiction

The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy (1922)

The Forsyte Saga is a series of three novels that chronicle the lives, loves, and fortunes of the upper-middle-class Forsyte family in England from the Victorian era through the early 20th century. The saga delves into themes of property, beauty, and the nature of love, highlighting the family’s struggles with social change, internal conflicts, and the challenges of maintaining their status amidst the evolving societal landscape. This volume contains all three novels.

• Length: 872 pages

The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran (1923)

The Prophet is a collection of poetic essays that unfold as a series of philosophical and spiritual conversations between the prophet Almustafa and the inhabitants of the city of Orphalese on topics ranging from love and marriage to freedom and death. As he prepares to board a ship that will take him home after twelve years of exile, Almustafa imparts his profound wisdom on the complexities of the human condition, offering insights that celebrate the unity and the contradictions of life’s experiences.

• Length: 108 pages
• Publication Year: 1923

Whose Body? by Dorothy L. Sayers ( Lord Peter Wimsey Series Book 1) (1923)

Whose Body? is the first novel featuring the aristocratic detective Lord Peter Wimsey, who investigates the mysterious appearance of a dead body in a bathtub wearing nothing but a pair of pince-nez glasses. The investigation leads Wimsey into a complex case involving a missing financier, mistaken identities, and a cunning murderer, showcasing his wit, erudition, and deductive skills.

• Length: 200 pages

The Boxcar Children by Gertrude Chandler Warner (1924)

The Boxcar Children tells the story of four orphaned siblings who make a home for themselves in an abandoned boxcar in the forest as they seek to avoid being placed under the guardianship of an unknown grandfather they believe to be cruel. Their resourcefulness, independence, and strong familial bonds help them create a happy life together until a twist of fate leads them to discover that their grandfather is actually kind and loving, ultimately bringing them into a new, loving home. This book is a family favorite around here.

• Length: 160 pages
• Publication Year: 1924

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald (1925)

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby unfolds during the simmering summer of 1922, offering a vivid glimpse into the era’s extravagance and social stratifications through the observant eyes of Nick Carraway. Intrigued by his enigmatic neighbor, Jay Gatsby, and his lavish soirées, Nick is drawn into the complexities of Gatsby’s quest to reclaim his lost love, Daisy Buchanan, despite her current marriage. This iconic novel weaves a rich tapestry of themes encompassing the pursuit of wealth, the illusion of love, and the intensity of desire, challenging readers to reflect on the deeper meanings of these pursuits.

• Length: 216 pages
• Publication Year: 1925

Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf (1925)

Mrs. Dalloway chronicles a day in the life of Clarissa Dalloway, a high-society woman in post-World War I England, as she prepares for a party she is hosting that evening. Through Woolf’s innovative stream-of-consciousness technique, the novel delves into the complex inner lives and memories of its characters, revealing the intersections of the personal and the political and the profound effects of time and social conventions on individual identity and relationships.

• Length: 240 pages

The Everlasting Man by G. K. Chesterton (1925)

The Everlasting Man presents a Christian apologetic critique of both secular history and various ideologies, arguing for the uniqueness of the Christian faith as a central pivot in human history. Chesterton contrasts the spiritual journey of mankind with the development of other religions and philosophies, ultimately positing that Christianity fulfills the deepest human needs and desires that those systems cannot, presenting Jesus Christ as the eternal figure who gives history and human life their ultimate meaning.

• Length: 316 pages
• Genre: Christian Apologetics

The Keeper of the Bees by Gene Stratton-Porter (1925)

The Keeper of the Bees centers around James Lewis MacFarlane, a World War I veteran who, upon deserting a military hospital to avoid further surgery, finds refuge and a new sense of purpose with an elderly beekeeper on the California coast. As he immerses himself in the peaceful world of beekeeping and the natural beauty that surrounds him, Jamie’s life intertwines with those of the beekeeper’s friends and a mysterious little girl named Scout, leading to a journey of healing, self-discovery, and unexpected love. I read this book more than 10 years ago, and I still think about it. Great for fans of Wendell Berry.

• Length: 282 pages

The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway (1926)

This book follows a group of American and British expatriates from the cafes of Paris to the bullfighting rings of Spain, capturing the disillusionment and existential crises of the post-World War I generation. The novel focuses on the love triangle between the impotent war veteran Jake Barnes, the enigmatic Lady Brett Ashley, and her various suitors, portraying their aimless lives and unattainable desires against a backdrop of lost ideals and the search for meaning in a post-war world.

• Length: 310 pages
• Publication Year: 1926

Winnie-the-Pooh by A. A. Milne (1926)

Before there was Toy Story , there was Winnie the Pooh. If you’ve never read Winnie the Pooh , then this is the book you must pick for this decade. This book follows the adventures of the good-natured but simple-minded teddy bear, Winnie-the-Pooh, and his friends in the Hundred Acre Wood, including Piglet, Eeyore, and Tigger. Through their charming and innocent escapades, the book explores themes of friendship, imagination, and the joy of childhood. I’ve been listening to this one on audio with my kids as we drive to school, and even my 14-year-old laughs out loud at these character’s antics. This book will put a smile on your face.

All Quite on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque (1928)

All Quiet on the Western Front portrays the harrowing experiences of German soldiers during World War I, focusing on the young protagonist Paul Bäumer and his comrades as they endure the brutal realities of trench warfare. The novel delves deeply into the physical and psychological traumas of war, highlighting the profound disconnection between the front-line experiences of the soldiers and the perceptions of those at home, ultimately questioning the value and cost of war on the human spirit. This is widely regarded as one of the greatest anti-war novels of all time.

• Publication Year: 1928

The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner (1929)

The Sound and the Fury is a profound exploration of the decline of the Compson family in the American South, told through a series of non-linear and stream-of-consciousness narratives from the perspectives of several family members. The novel delves into themes of time, memory, and the legacy of the past, as each section reflects the fragmented and subjective experiences of the characters, revealing the deep-seated conflicts and tragedies that underlie the family’s disintegration.

• Length: 326 pages
• Publication Year: 1929

The Bestselling Books from the 1920s

I think it’s interesting to compare the bestselling 1920s books with the books that we are still reading today.

• 1920: The Man of the Forest by Zane Grey is a Western story that revolves around Dale, a lone hunter with a deep understanding and respect for the wilderness, who becomes entangled in the protection of a woman and her sister.
• 1921: Main Street by Sinclair Lewis explores themes of small-town life, conformity, and the clash between urban and rural values.
• 1922: If Winter Comes by A. S. M. Hutchinson is about a man experiencing personal and professional turmoil in the tumultuous setting of post-World War I England.
• 1923: Black Oxen by Gertrude Atherton explores the intersection of science, femininity, and identity, as well as the public’s fascination with youth and the lengths to which people will go to preserve or recapture it.
• 1924: So Big by Edna Ferber is about a resilient and resourceful woman who faces life’s hardships with unwavering perseverance.
• 1925: Soundings by A. Hamilton Gibbs about the life and experiences of Martin Vale as he navigates personal and societal challenges in England during the post-World War I era.
• 1926: The Private Life of Helen of Troy by John Erskine retells the classic story of Helen, famed for her beauty and central role in sparking the Trojan War, by focusing on her personal life and character rather than her public persona.
• 1927: Elmer Gantry by Sinclair Lewis is about a charismatic but morally bankrupt salesman who becomes a fraudulent evangelical preacher.
• 1928: The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder is about the tragic collapse of an ancient Incan rope bridge in Peru and the deaths of five individuals who were on the bridge at the time.
• 1929: All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque is about the harrowing experiences of a young German soldier named Paul Bäumer and his comrades in the trenches during World War I.

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