The pioneer of modern fantasy was also its perfecter, because he knew. Raju says he will continue writing and adding to the biography. The guinness book of world records has a lot of variety, ranging from incredible feats by olympic athletes to the man who has the longest nails in the world this is a fact. Seasons came and went while i plowed through that one. Its claimed to be the longest single volume novel ever published in english. The second part of his work won international awards as soon as it was published and with them, an international reputation. The single bound book consists of 32 separate volumes. Its a book where all accomplishments are celebrated and theres a certain level of equality and respect for ones commitment to a cause, no matter how gross it is. The sword of shannara, the novel that gave birth of the modern fantasy genre, is a relatively modest 228,160 words. It is quite well known that the longest book in the bible is the psalms, of which there are 150 individual psalms. Its probably more disgusting than the woman who had sex with 919 men in a single day. Grossman tentatively plans to print just six copies of the book, each of which will comprise 4,000 volumes of 750 pages. It includes books that have sold over 10 million copies.
I love a long book that i can really get into, so i decided to compile a list of the. At 1,349 pages 1,488 pages softcover and 591,552 words, the book is one of the longest novels ever published in a single volume in the english language. Mcphersons pulitzer prizewinning battle cry of freedom, which puts the war in its political, economic, and social context the longest night is strictly a military history. Length of a book is typically associated with its sizespecifically page countleading many to assume the. Weve taken a look at the shortest books in the bible, but what about the longest book in the bible if youd asked me about it in sunday school, my answer would have been a quick, confident psalms. On books and literature, a gamefaqs message board topic titled whats the longest book youve read in a single day. Compiling a list of longest novels yields different results depending on whether pages, words or characters are counted. Is fifty shades of grey really the uks bestselling book. The longest night is a riveting, indispensable history of the war that james mcpherson in the foreword to this book calls the most dramatic, violent, and fateful experience in american history. Here are 8 crazy guinness world record holders in the sex. Biggest longest nonfiction books youve finished and enjoyed lets assume an arbitrary number of 500 page minimum. You can see a set of the photos from the poop here. See how it compares to the top 100 bestsellers of all time just the list, please get the data data journalism and data.
Largest singlevolume biography guinness world records. Unfortunately, his magnificent attempt was thwarted by exhaustion and he only made it to number 52. The ones that begin so grandly then morph into multivolume nightmares that never seem to end. Whats the longest novel not a encyclopedia ever written. It covers hundreds of engagements on land and sea, and along rivers. Theres sly humor as well as horror in eater and shatsi, and the volume closes with a series of informative story notes.
Proust produced the first volume of his volume masterpiece in 1912 it was first published in 19. Thats over three times the length of the shortest novel in the series, the philosophers stone. Longest and shortest book in the new testament daniel. Ive never seen an unabridged edition as a single volume due to architectural constraints. The 7 longest books in american history america fun fact. The order of the phoenix, the longest harry potter novel, is 257,045 words in length. Set in the aftermath of wwii, gravitys rainbow is one of the more difficult books to get through in our literature. For now, 23 volumes of the book novel are published, they contain 11,338,105 words.
On may 12th, mark z danielewskis new book, the familiar, volume 1. If you write a book according to the usual criteria, one person may like it, the other may dislike it, but when you write ten volumes, no one will say that the book is in eight. After so many years of having to juggle four volumes, the mises institute has finally put it all together in a single book. Rated the longest novel ever by the guinness book of world records, theres no doubt that prousts masterpiece could quite easily double up as a mightily effective doorstop, with volumes clocking up nearly 1. The profoundly influential volume work contains 9,609,000 characters, with each letter and space counting as one character. All records listed on our website are current and uptodate. Im not sure what the longest book that ive read was, but i can pretty much guarantee it was written by stephen king. It comes in at just under 800 pages, and was written by a 20th century reclusive master, thomas pynchon. Top 10 longest novels in the english language listverse. The longest, singlevolume, book i think i have read is a suitable boy by vikram seth, which amazon lists as 1,504 pages and goodreads has at 1,492 i actually read some, listened to some, then read some again, as i started this book whilst i was on a summer holiday in france with my parents.
All books of religious, idelogical, philosophical or political nature have been excluded from this list due to print figures that are missing or unreliable. Before seths novel, others turned to samuel richardsons clarissa as the longest novel with over a million words. On august 15, 2008 kirk williamson and richard mcculley broke the guinness books world record for the worlds longest handshake single hand when they met at aloha stadium in honolulu, hawaii and shook hands for 10 hours besting the previous record of 9 hours and 19 minutes set in 2006 on 21 september 2009, jack. And does one book mean one volume or do multiple volumes of a book still count as one. This is a list of the bestselling singlevolume books to date and in any language.
The largest single volume biography was written by dr. After some research ive found that the longest book in english and in the world is the blah story by nigel tomm. It took up,095 pages spread over 10 volumes, with over two million words, and a french name which is the reason why were not even bothering to write it out for you. It was published in ten volumes but considered a single work and. A single work includes works thought of as one novel by the author but published in multiple volumes for reasons of convenience. In the image above the blah story books taken from prleap.
The longest novel in a single volume that i have ever read is a suitable boy by vikram seth. It is a military history of a world war ii battle called kursk. However, the previous answer was incorrect the longest single volume story book written by king would be his uncut version of the stand not it. At 661,619 words it could never be published as a single volume except online, and that is where it is. Published in the 1950s and released in five volumes, this historical novel. In a single volume, my copy of crc handbook of chemistry and physics has over 2,192 pages and a font small. A sequel, to be called a suitable girl, was due for publication in 2017. Zettels traum bottoms dream in english by arno schmidt is about 1. The longest human poop ever recorded was an astounding 7. Its theme of involuntary memory is repeated through the course of following the narrators life, from childhood to adulthood.
Ten of the worlds longest books for reading addicts. The late american pornographic actor jon dough 19622006 planned to have sex with 101 women in a single day. What is the longest science fiction saga in amount of books that wasnt created after movies or tv shows that is, discarding star trek, star wars, xfiles. This books genre credentials have been disputed with the suggestion that varney is actually a madman rather than a real vampire, but there seems to be a general acceptance that the book is a genuine work of the fantastic, and the longest sff work ever published in one volume which it was in 1847. Rated the longest novel ever by the guinness book of world. The longest novel ever published was written in the 1600s. The actual title is the story of the vivian girls, in what is known as the realms of the unreal, of the glandecoangelinnian war storm, caused by the child slave rebellion by henry. Longest human poop ever recorded was an amazing 26 feet. It was written between 1996 and 2007 and chronicles the life of sri sathya sai baba india. Score a books total score is based on multiple factors, including the number of people who have voted for it and how highly those voters ranked the book. A glorious mess in a career of glorious messes, pynchons longest and loosest novel floats. The longest novel is artamene ou le grand cyrus, originally published in ten parts, each part in three volumes. Like no other conflict in our history, the civil war casts a long shadow onto modern america, writes david eicher. Seths suitable boy is the longest conventional novel in english since clarissa, and allegedly, according to a wikipedia participant, though source is not properly cited, the longest novel in the english language published in a single volume.
The kuniczak translation that i read totaled 1861 pages. I think i just wrote and had published the largest singlevolume history book ever. Hes been bucky and captain america now, james barnes re. The longest single volume that i have read is probably cryptonomicon by neal stephenson, at 1168 pages. The enduring conflict between america and alqaeda bergen, peter l. The longest one i know of is todd rundgrens utopia, which clocks in at 59.
Finally, we have what i think is my pick for the longest book ever published. Even the authors know they are bloated beasts, for example take tad williams, writer of. Yep, that is my summer reading, he replied, glancing down at the 1,088page behemoth of a novel. Length of a book is typically associated with its sizespecifically page countleading many to. I figured this because the book has 150 psalms, and the runnerup in chapter count would have been isaiah, with a meager 66 chaptersthats less than half of what psalms has. I could think of three or four recommendations for a good singlevolume world history book, but not so much for a u. The new singlevolume edition of conceived in liberty is here. Its theme of involuntary memory is repeated through the course of following. While not for the novice reader, this book is rewarding to read and is one of the longest science fiction books of all time. Longest and shortest book in the new testament july 11, 2011 posted by daniel ayad in unique. The largest single novel, published in more than one volume but not a series is probably the deluge by henryk sienkiewicz, usually published as two volumes. This is a list of the novels over 500,000 words published through a mainstream publisher. The book is the first installment of a novel in twentyseven parts. Tbnokas is far greater in length than the longest widely read novel leo tolstoys war and peace.
Coming in at 629,858 words that fill 20 pages, walls of phantoms which retells the odyssey in a modern setting is the thirdlongest singlevolume novel written, and perhaps the longest by an africanamerican. For a full list of record titles, please use our record. But savoring a book of, say, 800 pages or longer is a project. A suitable boy is a novel by vikram seth, published in 1993. The longest nonfiction book that i have read was edward gibbons the decline and fall of the roman empire, which is approximately 4000 pages in length.
Thats not to say that that an 1192 page postmodern book published as a two volume uncorrected proof wasnt written by someone in the middle of a mental break, as the organization of the book with lower case chapters, allcaps chapters, and. This makes it easier to listen to and makes clearer just what a contribution this book is to the history of libertarian literature. One rainy day in may, will be published by pantheon. And now the mighty, unstoppable junkerfornaught,tbokas has in its sights as its next target xavier herberts poor fellow my country 850,000 words. The longest novel i have read that is made up of multiple volumes, but which is designed as a. It was published in ten volumes but considered a single work and contains 2. Armen shekoyan, an armenian writer committed to producing the worlds longest novel, says. The big nonfiction 194 books meet your next favorite book.
The trilogy is available in single volumes and best read that way. It is supposedly the worlds longest published novel in english at 2. I love a long book that i can really get into, so i decided to compile a list of the longest novels ever written. To celebrate the launch of this gargantuan project by one of my favorite authors, i have put together a list of seven other book series that have many parts. Although there are other onevolume histories of the civil war most notably james m.
993 552 467 1299 1459 1287 1130 1360 522 1462 1272 429 552 1039 1526 1026 178 359 1300 1075 776 1198 37 1437 728 1372 1428 1461 142 524 541 1146 221 62 905 380 1129 370 964