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Articles - May - 2007 Issue

What are the Top 10 Most Common Books in Libraries?

- by Michael Stillman

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The 15th most popular, and first cartoon book, is not, as you might expect, Peanuts (number 69), but Garfield. Is this for real? The Grapes of Wrath is 101, Oedipus Rex is 187, Goethe's Faust 33, War and Peace 93, The Cat in the Hat is 444, and Garfield is 15? Is this what's wrong with libraries today? How much higher would Garfield be if he were actually funny? For those who like cartoons, along with Peanuts, Calvin and Hobbes is 77, Doonesbury 88, the Far Side 115, and Dilbert 399.

A total of 849 books averaged at least one copy per ten libraries. The last of these was Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire. At number 1,000 is a recent book, from 1999: Southern Cross, by mystery writer Patricia Daniels Cornwell. She is apparently a descendant of, or somehow related to, Harriet Beecher Stowe, whose Uncle Tom's Cabin is number 59.

The entire OCLC Top 1,000 may be found at www.oclc.org/research/top1000/complete.htm.

From past issues of AE Monthly:

The AE Top 500 sales at auction:
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The BookFinder Top 10 most searched for books:
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Abebooks Top 10 sold and searched for books:
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Rare Book Monthly

  • ALDE, Apr. 8: GUEVARA (ANTONIO DE). Histoire de Marc-Aurèle, Empereur Romain, vray miroir et horloge des Princes. Paris, Pierre et Galliot du Pré, frères, 1565. €3,000 to €4,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: HEURES DE LA VIERGE. Horæ in laudem beatissimæ virginis Mariæ ad usum Romanum. Paris, Charles L'Angelier, 1556. €4,000 to €5,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: MONTAIGNE (MICHEL DE). Les Essais. Édition nouvelle, trouvée après le deceds de l'autheur… Paris, Abel L'Angelier, 1595. €6,000 to €8,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: [ROJAS (FERNANDO DE)]. Celestina, tragicomedia di Calisto et Melibea, tradotta de lingua castigliana in italiano idioma… Venise, 1531. €2,000 to €3,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: CAMÕES (LUÍS DE). Os Lusiadas. Lisbonne, Pedro Crasbeeck, 1613. €2,000 to €3,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: CERVANTES (MIGUEL DE). El Ingenioso hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha. Bruxelles, Roger Velpius & Huberto Antonio, 1611. €6,000 to €8,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: LA FONTAINE (JEAN DE). Fables choisies, mises en vers. Paris, Denys Thierry et Claude Barbin, 1678-1694. €6,000 to €8,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: CERVANTES (MIGUEL DE). El Ingenioso hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha. Madrid, Joaquin Ibarra, 1780. €3,000 to €4,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: DIDEROT (DENIS) ET JEAN LE ROND D'ALEMBERT. Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers. Paris, 1751-1765. €15,000 to €20,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: [LIVRE TISSÉ]. LAMARTINE (Alphonse de). Les Laboureurs. Poème tiré de Jocelyn… Lyon, J. A. Henry, 1883. €8,000 to €10,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: [LIVRE TISSÉ]. Livre de prières tissé d'après les enluminures des manuscrits du XIVe au XVIe siècle. Lyon, [A. Roux], 1886. €5,000 to €6,000.

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