The Transit of Venus by Shirley Hazzard (1980). Like planets moving across the sky—always the same yet always changing—this sumptuously written novel follows the lives of two orphaned sisters who leave Australia in the 1950s to begin new lives in England.
The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera (1984). Kundera’s masterpiece begins during the Prague Spring of 1968, when it appeared the Soviet Union’s domination of Czechoslovakia might be weakening and ends a few years later when those hopes were dashed.
The Untouchable by John Banville (1997). Loosely based on the life of Cambridge spy Anthony F. Blunt, the novel opens in 1979, when seventy-two-year-old Vic Maskell’s crimes have been publicly exposed.
The Trial by Franz Kafka (1925). The Trial is not just a book, but a cultural icon; Kafka is not just a writer but a mindset—“Kafkaesque.” Here, Everyman Josef K is persecuted by a mysterious and sadistic Law, which has condemned him in advance for a crime of which he knows nothing.
The War with the Newts by Karel Capek (1936). This prescient and humorous Czech novel—part allegory, part satire, part science fiction romp—begins with the discovery of a new species of giant newt by a sea captain in an obscure tropical bay.
The Waves by Virgina Woolf (1931). This grand experiment in narrative depicts six characters—from nursery school to the brink of old age—through a series of interior soliloquies. Stages in their lives are framed by bits of description of a day on a deserted beach; the book’s finale, their reunion at a London restaurant, is a tour de force.
The Way of All Flesh by Samuel Butler (1903). One of the great critiques of Victorian society and morality, this autobiographical novel charts the Pontifex family over several generations. Through the rise and fall of the main character’s piety, Butler rebukes a religious tradition that has grown oppressive and hypocritical.
The White Albumby Joan Didion (1979). This essay collection records indelibly the upheavals and aftermaths of the 1960s. Examining key events, figures, and trends of the era—including Charles Manson, the Black Panthers, and the shopping mall—through the lens of her own spiritual confusion, Joan Didion helped to define mass culture as we now understand it.
The Widow's Children by Paula Fox (1976).
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami (1994).