The problem of predicting what will last

The problem of predicting what will last by Allan Massie in the January 4th, 2000 edition of the Daily Telegraph.

Each week for the past two years The Daily Telegraph's literary editor has asked a contributor to name and describe his or her "Book of the Century", and today the series concludes with Arthur C. Clarke's choice. The full selection invites comparison with a list drawn up by The Telegraph a century ago; we print both here.

The comparison cannot, however, be exact. All the books chosen in 1899 were fiction - the paper offered its readers the "100 Best Novels in the World", selected by the editor "with the assistance of Sir Edwin Arnold, K. C. I. E, H. D. Traill, D. C. L, and W. L. Courtney, LL. D.".

The modern list includes poetry, plays, history, diaries, philosophy, economics, memoirs, biography and travel writing. It is certainly eclectic, ranging from Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, selected by David Sylvester, to The Wind in the Willows, chosen by John Bayley, and Down with Skool, Wendy Cope's Book of the Century.

Read the whole thing.