1001 Tale of Genji
Japanese author Murasaki Shibubi produces, in The Tale of Genji, a book which can be considered the world's first novel

1605 Don Quixote
Spanish author Miguel de Cervantes publishes the first part of his satirically romantic novel Don Quixote

1680 Bunyan and Mr Badman
John Bunyan publishes The Life and Death of Mr Badman, an allegory of a misspent life that is akin to a novel

1688 Aphra Behn attacks slave trade
Aphra Behn's novel Oroonoko makes an early protest against the inhumanity of the African slave trade

1719 Crusoe meets Man Friday
Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, with its detailed realism, can be seen as the first English novel

1747 Clarissa a keen letter-writer
Samuel Richardson's Clarissa begins the correspondence which grows into the longest novel in the English language

1749 Tom Jones loves Sophia Western
Henry Fielding introduces a character of lasting appeal in the lusty but good-hearted Tom Jones

1759 Candide hopes for the best
Voltaire publishes Candide, a satire on optimism prompted by the Lisbon earthquake of 1755

1759 Tristram Shandy conceived
Laurence Sterne publishes the first two volumes of Tristram Shandy, beginning with the scene at the hero's conception

1762 Calls for Rousseau's arrest
Two books in this year, Émile and Du Contrat Social, prompt orders for the arrest of Jean-Jacques Rousseau

1764 Castle of Otranto
English author Horace Walpole provides an early taste of Gothic thrills in his novel Castle of Otranto

1766 Vicar of Wakefield
Irish novelist Oliver Goldsmith publishes The Vicar of Wakefield, with a hero who has much to complain about but keeps calm

1774 Goethe wins with weepy novel
Goethe's romantic novel, The Sorrows of Young Werther, brings him an immediate European reputation

1794 Goethe and Schiller in Weimar
Goethe and Schiller become friends, and together create the movement known as Weimar classicism

1798 Charles Brockden Brown's Wieland
US author Charles Brockden Brown publishes Wieland, the first of four novels setting Gothic romance in an American context

1809 Irving hides behind Knickerbocker
Washington Irving uses the fictional Dutch scholar Diedrich Knickerbocker as the supposed author of his comic History of New York

1811 Sense and Sensibility
English author Jane Austen publishes her first work in print, Sense and Sensibility, at her own expense

1813 Pride and Prejudice
Pride and Prejudice, based on a youthful work of 1797 called First Impressions, is the second of Jane Austen's novels to be published

1818 Jane Austen published posthumously
Two of Jane Austen's novels, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion, are published in the year after her death

1818 Mary Shelley's Frankenstein
Mary Shelley publishes Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus, a Gothic tale about giving life to an artificial man

1819 Ivanhoe
Walter Scott publishes Ivanhoe, a tale of love, tournaments and sieges at the time of the crusades

1820 Rip Van Winkle wakes up
Washington Irving tells the story of the long sleep of Rip Van Winkle in his Sketch Book

1821 Fenimore Cooper's The Spy
The Spy, a romance set in the American Revolution, establishes the reputation of US author James Fenimore Cooper

1823 First of the Leather-Stocking Tales
James Fenimore Cooper's The Pioneers introduces Natty Bumppo, frontiersman known for his 'leather stockings'

1825 Manzoni publishes I Promessi Sposi
Italian author Alessandro Manzoni begins publication (completed 1827) of his novel I Promessi Sposi ('The Betrothed')

1826 The Last of the Mohicans
In James Fenimore Cooper's The Last of the Mohicans, Natty Bumppo sides with a Mohican chief

1830 Le Rouge et Le Noir
French author Stendhal publishes his novel Le Rouge et Le Noir ('The Red and the Black')

1831 Hunchback of Notre Dame
Victor Hugo publishes his novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame, in which the hunchback, Quasimodo, is obsessed with Esmeralda

1833 Eugene Onegin
Alexander Pushkin publishes a novel in verse, Eugene Onegin

1834 Pushkin's Queen of Spades
Alexander Pushkin publishes his best-known short story, The Queen of Spades

1834 Guy Rivers
American novelist William Gilmore Simms publishes Guy Rivers, the first of his series known as the Border Romances

1835 Balzac publishes Le Père Goriot
French author Honoré de Balzac publishes Le Père Goriot, one of the key novels that he later includes in La Comédie Humaine

1835 The Partisan
The Partisan, set in South Carolina, launches the series of novels by William Gilmore Simms known as the Revolutionary Romances

1836 Pickwick Papers
24-year-old Charles Dickens begins monthly publication of his first work of fiction, Pickwick Papers (published in book form in 1837)

1837 Oliver Twist
Charles Dickens' first novel, Oliver Twist, begins monthly publication (in book form, 1838)

1838 Hawthorne's Fanshawe
US author Nathaniel Hawthorne publishes Fanshawe, his first novel, at his own expense

1839 Fall of the House of Usher
Edgar Allan Poe publishes a characteristically gothic tale, The Fall of the House of Usher

1841 Poe invents the detective story
August Dupin solves the case in Edgar Allan Poe's The Murders in the Rue Morgue, considered to be the first example of a detective story

1842 Dead Souls
The publication of the first part of the satirical novel Dead Souls, by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol, proves a sensation in Russia

1842 Start of La Comédie Humaine
Honoré de Balzac begins publication of a collected edition of his fiction under the title La Comédie Humaine

1843 The Pit and the Pendulum
Edgar Allan Poe publishes The Pit and the Pendulum, a cliff-hanging tale of terror at the hands of the Spanish Inquisition

1843 A Christmas Carol
Ebenezer Scrooge mends his ways just in time in Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol

1844 Disraeli develops one-nation Conservatism
In his novel Coningsby Benjamin Disraeli develops the theme of Conservatism uniting 'two nations', the rich and the poor

1847 Thackeray's Vanity Fair
English author William Makepeace Thackeray begins publication of his novel Vanity Fair in monthly parts (book form 1848)

1847 Jane Eyre
Charlotte becomes the first of the Brontë sisters to have a novel published — Jane Eyre

1847 Wuthering Heights
Emily Brontë's novel Wuthering Heights follows just two months after her sister Charlotte's Jane Eyre

1848 Completion of La Comédie Humaine
Honoré de Balzac completes publication of La Comédie Humaine, a 17-volume collected edition of his numerous novels and stories

1849 David Copperfield
Charles Dickens begins the publication in monthly numbers of David Copperfield, his own favourite among his novels

1850 The Scarlet Letter
Nathaniel Hawthorne publishes his novel The Scarlet Letter, in which Hester Prynne is forced to wear the letter A for Adultress

1851 House of the Seven Gables
US author Nathaniel Hawthorne bases his novel The House of the Seven Gables on a curse invoked against his own family

1851 Moby Dick
Herman Melville publishes Moby Dick; or, The Whale, a novel based on his own 18-month experience on a whaler in 1841-2

1852 Uncle Tom's Cabin
Harriet Beecher Stowe publishes a massively successful antislavery novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin, that sells 300,000 copies in its first year

1855 Trollope begins the Barchester series
English author Anthony Trollope publishes The Warden, the first in his series of six Barsetshire novels

1856 George Eliot's first story is published
G.H. Lewes encourages Marian to try her hand at fiction and her first story, 'The Sad Fortunes of the Reverend Amos Barton' is successfully published

1856 Madame Bovary
Gustave Flaubert publishes Madame Bovary, a novel of frustrated romanticism in a provincial French context

1857 Tom Brown begins his schooldays
In Tom Brown's Schooldays Thomas Hughes depicts the often brutal aspects of an English public school

1858 Holmes at the breakfast table
Oliver Wendell Holmes' book The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table is the first in a breakfast-table series

1859 February Adam Bede
English author George Eliot wins fame with her first full-length novel, Adam Bede

1859 La Chartreuse de Parme
French author Stendhal publishes his novel La Chartreuse de Parme ('The Charterhouse of Parma')

1859 Tale of Two Cities
Charles Dickens publishes his French Revolution novel, A Tale of Two Cities

1860 Great Expectations
Charles Dickens begins serial publication of his novel "Great Expectations" (in book form 1861)

1860 Mill on the Floss
George Eliot publishes The Mill on the Floss, her novel about the childhood of Maggie and Tom Tulliver

1861 East Lynne
Mrs Henry Wood publishes her first novel, East Lynne, which becomes the basis of the most popular of all Victorian melodramas

1862 Hugo publishes Les Misérables
Victor Hugo publishes his novel Les Misérables, an immensely complex story about the adventures of ex-convict Jean Valjean

1862 Lewis Carroll tells Alice a story
Oxford mathematician Lewis Carroll tells 10-year-old Alice Liddell, on a boat trip, a story about her own adventures in Wonderland

1862 Dostoevsky's House of the Dead
Dostoevsky publishes Notes from the House of the Dead, a semi-autobiographical novel about life in a Siberian labour camp

1863 The Water-Babies
English author Charles Kingsley publishes an improving fantasy for young children, The Water-Babies

1864 Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground
Dostoevsky publishes Notes from Underground, the bitter memories of a retired civil servant that is often described as the first existentialist novel

1865 Jumping Frog brings fame to Mark Twain
Samuel Clemens, writing under the pseudonym Mark Twain, has immediate success with The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County

1865 Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Lewis Carroll publishes Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, a development of the story he had told Alice Liddell three years earlier

1865 First volume of War and Peace
Leo Tolstoy publishes the first volume of his epic novel War and Peace, following the lives of several aristocratic families during the Napoleonic wars

1866 Crime and Punishment
Dostoevsky publishes Crime and Punishment, a novel narrated by Raskolnikov, a St Petersburg student and murderer

1868 Little Women
US author Louisa May Alcott begins serial publication of her book for children, Little Women (in book form 1869)

1868 Dostoevsky's The Idiot
Dostoevsky publishes The Idiot, a novel about the simple-minded and truthful Prince Myshkin

1871 Zola begins, Les Rougon-Macquart
French author Émile Zola publishes The Fortune of the Rougons, the first in a 20-novel series that he calls Les Rougon-Macquart

1871 Middlemarch
George Eliot publishes Middlemarch, in which Dorothea makes a disastrous marriage to the pedantic Edward Casaubon

1873 The Gilded Age
The Gilded Age, by Charles Dudley Warner and Mark Twain, provides the familiar name for life in the US towards the end of the nineteenth century

1874 Far from the Madding Crowd
English author Thomas Hardy has his first success with his novel Far from the Madding Crowd

1875 Anna Karenina
Leo Tolstoy publishes the first volume of his novel Anna Karenina, in which the heroine develops a fatal love for Count Vronsky

1875 Henry James's Roderick Hudson
Henry James's early novel Roderick Hudson is serialized in the Atlantic Monthly and is published in book form in 1876

1876 Tom Sawyer
Mark Twain publishes The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, in which Tom and his friends find excitement in a small town on the Mississippi

1879 Uncle Remus puts in an appearance
US author Joel Chandler Harris introduces Uncle Remus in a story in the Constitution

1879 Daisy Miller delights the public
Henry James's story Daisy Miller, about an American girl abroad, brings him a new readership

1880 Bouvard et Pécuchet
Gustave Flaubert dies, with his novel Bouvard et Pécuchet incomplete

1880 The Brothers Karamazov
Dostoevsky publishes his novel The Brothers Karamazov, featuring the four sons of the depraved Feodor Pavlovich Karamazov

1880 Ben-Hur
US author Lew Wallace publishes a historical novel, Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ

1881 Washington Square
In Washington Square Henry James tells the sad story of heiress Catherine Sloper

1881 Uncle Remus has a book of his own
Joel Chandler Harris publishes Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings, the first of many Uncle Remus volumes

1881 Portrait of a Lady
Henry James's novel The Portrait of a Lady studies an American girl, Isabel Archer, in the unfamiliar context of Europe

1883 Treasure Island
Robert Louis Stevenson's adventure story, Treasure Island, features Long John Silver and Ben Gunn

1884 Huckleberry Finn
Huck Finn and his friend Tom Sawyer continue their exploits on the Mississippi in Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

1885 Rise of Silas Lapham
In his novel The Rise of Silas Lapham US author William Dean Howells follows the fortunes of a self-made man in Boston

1886 Little Lord Fauntleroy
US author Frances Hodgson Burnett publishes Little Lord Fauntleroy, featuring an aristocratic child in a velvet suit

1886 Jekyll and Hyde
Robert Louis Stevenson introduces a dual personality in his novel The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde

1886 Mayor of Casterbridge
Thomas Hardy publishes his novel The Mayor of Casterbridge, which begins with the future mayor, Michael Henchard selling his wife and child at a fair

1887 Conan Doyle introduces Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes features in Conan Doyle's first novel, A Study in Scarlet

1890 The Young Visiters
9-year-old Daisy Ashford imagines an adult romance and high society in The Young Visiters

1891 Billy Budd in manuscript on Melville's death
Herman Melville dies in obscurity in New York, with an unpublished manuscript of Billy Budd (not printed till 1924)

1891 Dorian Gray
Oscar Wilde publishes his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray in which the ever-youthful hero's portrait grows old and ugly

1891 Hardy's Tess of the Durbervilles
Thomas Hardy publishes his novel Tess of the Durbervilles, with a dramatic finale at Stonehenge

1892 Diary of a Nobody
Mr Pooter is the suburban anti-hero of the The Diary of a Nobody, by George and Weedon Grossmith

1893 Maggie: A Girl of the Streets
US author Stephen Crane cannot find a publisher for his first novel, Maggie: A Girl of the Streets, so issues it privately

1894 Trilby
French-born artist and author George du Maurier publishes his novel Trilby

1894 The Jungle Book
Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book surrounds the child Mowgli with a collection of vivid animal guardians

1895 The Red Badge of Courage
Stephen Crane succeeds handsomely with his second novel, The Red Badge of Courage, set in the American Civil War

1895 The Time Machine
H.G. Wells publishes The Time Machine, a story about a Time Traveller whose first stop on his journey is the year 802701

1896 Tilbury Town makes its first appearance
The prolific US poet Edwin Arlington Robinson publishes The Torrent and the Night Before, his first poems about the fictional Tilbury Town

1897 What Maisie Knew
Henry James views the feckless adults in Maisie's life through the eyes of the child herself in What Maisie Knew

1897 Maugham's Liza of Lambeth
Somerset Maugham publishes his first novel, Liza of Lambeth, based on the London life he has observed as a medical student

1897 Dracula sucks his first blood
English author Bram Stoker publishes Dracula, his gothic tale of vampirism in Transylvania

1898 The War of the Worlds
H.G. Wells publishes his science-fiction novel The War of the Worlds, in which Martians arrive in a rocket to invade earth

1898 The Turn of the Screw
Henry James publishes The Turn of the Screw in a collection of short stories

1899 E. Nesbit introduces Bastable family
E. Nesbit publishes The Story of the Treasure Seekers, introducing the Bastable family who feature in several of her books for children

1900 The Wizard of Oz
Frank Baum introduces children to Oz, in his book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

1900 Stephen Crane dies young
After a prodigiously productive career as novelist and journalist, Stephen Crane dies of tuberculosis at the age of 28

1900 The Son of the Wolf
Jack London's first collection of stories, The Son of the Wolf, brings him a wide readership

1900 Sister Carrie fails at first
Theodore Dreiser's first novel, Sister Carrie, receives no publicity because his publisher, Frank Doubleday, considers it immoral

1900 Ellen Glasgow's Voice of the People
The Voice of the People is the first of Ellen Glasgow's novels set in her native state, Virginia

1900 Lord Jim
Joseph Conrad publishes his novel Lord Jim about a life of failure and redemption in the far East

1901 Buddenbrooks
Thomas Mann's first novel, Buddenbrooks, brings him immediate success

1901 The Tale of Peter Rabbit
Beatrix Potter publishes at her own expense The Tale of Peter Rabbit

1901 Kipling's Kim
Rudyard Kipling's experiences of India are put to good use in his novel Kim

1901 Frank Norris's The Octopus
Frank Norris publishes The Octopus, the first of a projected trilogy of novels set in Southern California

1902 Wharton's Valley of Decision
Edith Wharton's publishes her first full-length novel, The Valley of Decision

1902 Just So Stories
Rudyard Kipling publishes his Just So Stories for Little Children

1902 Tale of Peter Rabbit published commercially
The Tale of Peter Rabbit is published commercially, a year after being first printed by Beatrix Potter at her own expense

1902 The Hound of the Baskervilles
Conan Doyle's The Hound of the Baskervilles begins publication in serial form

1902 The Wings of the Dove
Henry James publishes the first of his three last novels, The Wings of the Dove

1902 Heart of Darkness
Joseph Conrad publishes a collection of stories including Heart of Darkness, a sinister tale based partly on his own journey up the Congo

1903 The Call of the Wild
US author Jack London publishes a novel, The Call of the Wild, in which a huge pet dog has alarming adventures

1903 Riddle of the Sands
Erskine Childers has a best-seller in The Riddle of the Sands, a thriller about a planned German invasion of Britain

1903 The Ambassadors
Henry James publishes The Ambassadors, the second of his three last novels written in rapid succession

1903 Frank Norris's The Pit
The Pit, the second volume of an uncompleted trilogy by US novelist Frank Norris, is published posthumously

1904 Nostromo
Joseph Conrad publishes his novel Nostromo, about a revolution in South America and a fatal horde of silver

1904 The Golden Bowl
Henry James publishes his last completed novel, The Golden Bowl

1904 H.H. Munro becomes Saki
Under the pseudonym Saki, H.H. Munro publishes Reginald, his first volume of short stories

1905 The House of Mirth
Edith Wharton publishes the novel that brings her fame and fortune, The House of Mirth

1905 Kipps
H.G. Wells publishes Kipps: the story of a simple soul, a comic novel about a bumbling draper's assistant

1905 The Clansman
Thomas Dixon's popular novel The Clansman presents the Ku Klux Klan in heroic terms

1905 Elusive Pimpernel baffles French
Sir Percy Blakeney rescues aristocrats from the guillotine in Baroness Orczy's The Scarlet Pimpernel

1906 Upton Sinclair's The Jungle
Upton Sinclair publishes The Jungle, a hard-hitting novel about the Chicago meat-packing industry

1906 E.Nesbit's The Railway Children
E. Nesbit publishes The Railway Children, the most successful of her books featuring the Bastable family

1906 Galsworthy begins his Forsyte saga
John Galsworthy publishes The Man of Property, the first of his novels chronicling the family of Soames Forsyte

1907 Gorky's The Mother
Russian author Maxim Gorky completes his novel Mat ("The Mother"), written mainly during a visit to the USA

1907 Gosse's Father and Son
Edmund Gosse publishes Father and Son, an account of his difficult relationship with his fundamentalist father, Philip Gosse

1907 Dubliners completed
James Joyce completes the eight short stories eventually published in 1914 as Dubliners

1908 Jack London's Iron Heel
Jack London's novel Iron Heel foresees a future repressive capitalist regime in the USA

1908 The Wind in the Willows
Rat, Mole and Toad, in Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows, appeal to a wide readership

1908 Anatole France's Penguin Island
Anatole France casts a satirical eye on human society in his novel L'Île des pingouins ("Penguin Island")

1908 Anne of Green Gables
Lucy Maud Montgomery's first novel, Anne of Green Gables, brings her instant fame and fortune

1909 Gide's La Porte étroite
André Gide publishes La Porte étroite ('Strait is the Gate')

1909 Jack London's Martin Eden
Jack London publishes his most autobiographical novel, Martin Eden

1909 Ann Veronica
The heroine of H.G. Wells' novel Ann Veronica is a determined example of the New Woman

1910 Prester John
John Buchan publishes Prester John, the first of his adventure stories

1910 The History of Mr Polly
H.G. Wells publishes The History of Mr Polly, a novel about an escape from drab everyday existence

1910 Howard's End
E.M. Forster publishes Howard's End, his novel about the Schlegel sisters and the Wilcox family

1911 Lawrence's The White Peacock
D.H. Lawrence's career as a writer is launched with the publication of his first novel, The White Peacock

1911 Father Brown solves his first case
G.K. Chesterton's clerical detective makes his first appearance in The Innocence of Father Brown

1911 Katherine Mansfield's first collection
In a German Pension is New Zealand author Katherine Mansfield's first collection of stories

1911 The Secret Garden
Frances Hodgson Burnett publishes The Secret Garden, which becomes a classic of children's literature

1911 Zuleika Dobson
Max Beerbohm publishes his novel Zuleika Dobson, in which the beauty of his heroine causes havoc among the students at Oxford

1913 O Pioneers
In O Pioneers Willa Cather finds her major theme, life on the frontier

1913 Pollyanna
In Pollyanna Eleanor Porter introduces an immensely successful character, the irrepressibly optimistic orphan Pollyanna Whittier

1913 Compton Mackenzie's Sinister Street
Compton Mackenzie publishes the first volume of his autobiographial novel Sinister Street

1913 Death in Venice>/I>
German author Thomas Mann publishes the novella Death in Venice