Last Wednesday, I suggested that there was no golden era where everyone was reading complex literary fiction.

Is that actually true? Did past readers have more refined taste in fiction than we do now?

Here’s a list of the bestselling novel by year from 1900 to the present (source), along with the books published that same year that were part of Modern Library’s list of the 100 best novels.

What do you make of this list?

1900: To Have and To Hold by Mary Johnston

Also published: Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser, Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad

1901: The Crisis by Winston Churchill (note: the American novelist)

Also published: Kim by Rudyard Kipling

1902: The Virginian by Owen Wister

Also published: Wings of the Dove by Henry James

1903: Lady Rose’s Daughter by Mary Augusta Ward

Also published: Way of All Flesh by Samuel Butler, The Ambassadors by Henry James, The Call of the Wild by Jack London

1904: The Crossing by Winston Churchill

Also published: The Golden Bowl by Henry James, Nostromo by Joseph Conrad

1905: The Marriage of William Ashe by Mary Augusta Ward

Also published: The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton

1906: Coniston by Winston Churchill

1907: The Lady of the Decoration by Frances Little

Also published: The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad

1908: Mr. Crewe’s Career by Winston Churchill

Also published: A Room With a View by E.M. Forster, The Old Wives’ Tale by Arnold Bennett

1909: The Inner Shrine by Basil King

1910: The Rosary by Florence Barclay

Also published: Howard’s End by E.M. Forster

1911: The Broad Highway by Jeffrey Farnol

Also published: Zuleika Dobson by Max Beerbohm

1912: The Harvester by Gene Stratton Porter

1913: The Inside of the Cup by Winston Churchill

Also published: Sons and Lovers by D.H. Lawrence

1914: The Eyes of the World by Harold Bell Wright

1915: The Turmoil by Booth Tarkington

Also published: The Good Soldier by Ford Maddox Ford, The Rainbow by D.H. Lawrence, Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham

1916: Seventeen by Booth Tarkington

1917: Mr. Britling Sees It Through by H.G. Wells

Also published: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce

1918: The U.P. Trail by Zane Grey

Also published: The Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington

1919: The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse by V. Blasco Ibanez

Also published: Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson

1920: The Man of the Forest by Zane Grey

Also published: The Rainbow by D.H. Lawrence, The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton

1921: Main Street by Sinclair Lewis*

1922: If Winter Comes by A.S.M. Hutchison

Also published: Ulysses by James Joyce

1923: Black Oxen by Gertrude Atherton

1924: So Big by Edna Ferber

Also published: A Passage to India by E.M. Forster, Parade’s End by Ford Maddox Ford

1925: Soundings by A. Hamilton Gibbs

Also published: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser

1926: The Private Life of Helen of Troy by John Erskine

Also published: The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

1927: Elmer Gantry by Sinclair Lewis

Also published: To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf, Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather

1928: The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder*

Also published: Point Counter Point by Aldous Huxley

1929: All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque

Also published: The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner, A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes, A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway

1930: Cimarron by Edna Ferber

Also published: As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner, The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett

1931: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

Also published: Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

1932: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

Also published: Light in August by William Faulkner, Tobacco Road by Erskine Caldwell

1933: Anthony Adverse by Hervey Allen

1934: Anthony Adverse by Hervey Allen

Also published: I, Claudius by Robert Graves, Appointment in Samarra by John O’Hara, Tender is the Nighta by F. Scott Fitzgerald, A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh, Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller, The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M. Cain

1935: Green Light by Lloyd C. Douglas

Also published: Studs Lonigan by James T. Farrell

1936: Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

1937: Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

1938: The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings

Also published: U.S.A. by John Dos Passos, Scoop by Evelyn Waugh, The Death of the Heart by Elizabeth Bowen

1939: The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck*

Also published: The Day of the Locust by Nathanael West, Finnegans Wake by James Joyce

1940: How Green Was My Valley by Richard Llewellyn

Also published: Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers, Native Son by Richard Wright

1941: The Keys of the Kingdom by A.J. Cronin

1942: The Song of Bernadette by Franz Werfel

1943: The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas

1944: Strange Fruit by Lillian Smith

1945: Forever Amber by Kathleen Winsor

Also published: The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh, Loving by Henry Green

1946: The King’s General by Daphne du Maurier

Also published: Animal Farm by George Orwell, All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren

1947: The Miracle of the Bells by Russell Janney

Also published: Under the Volcano by Malcolm Lowry

1948: The Big Fisherman by Lloyd C. Douglas

Also published: The Heart of the Matter by Graham Greene, The Naked and the Dead by Norman Mailer

1949: The Egyptian by Mika Waltari

Also published: 1984 by George Orwell, The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles

1950: The Cardinal by Henry Morton Robinson

1951: From Here to Eternity by James Jones*

Also published: A Dance to the Music of Time by Anthony Powell

1952: The Silver Chalice by Thomas B. Costain

Also published: Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

1953: The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas

Also published: Go Tell it on the Mountain by James Baldwin, The Adventures of Augie March by Saul Bellow

1954: Not as a Stranger by Morton Thompson

Also published: Lord of the Flies by William Golding, Under the Net by Iris Murdoch

1955: Marjorie Morningstar by Herman Wouk

Also published: Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov, The Ginger Man by J.P. Donleavy

1956: Don’t Go Near the Water by William Brinkley

1957: By Love Possessed by James Gould Cozzens

Also published: On the Road by Jack Kerouac, The Alexandria Quartet by Lawrence Durrell

1958: Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak

1959: Exodus by Leon Uris

Also published: Henderson the Rain King by Saul Bellow

1960: Advise and Consent by Allen Drury

1961: The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone

Also published: Catch-22 by Joseph Heller, The Moviegoer by Walker Percy, A House for Mr. Biswas by V.S. Naipul, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark

1962: Ship of Fools by Katherine Anne Porter

Also published: Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov, A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

1963: The Shoes of Fisherman by Morris L. West

1964: The Spy Who Came in From the Cold by John Le Carre

1965: The Source by James A. Michener

1966: Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann

Also published: The Magus by John Fowles, Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys

1967: The Arrangement by Elia Kazan

Also published: The Wapshot Chronicle by John Cheever

1968: Airport by Arthur Hailey

1969: Portnoy’s Complaint by Philip Roth*

Also published: Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut

1970: Love Story by Erich Segal

Also published: Deliverance by James Dickey

1971: Wheels by Arthur Hailey

Also published: Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner

1972: Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach

1973: Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach

1974: Centennial by James A. Michener

1975: Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow*

1976: Trinity by Leon Uris

1977: The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien and Christopher Tolkien

1978: Chesapeake by James A. Michener

1979: The Matarese Circle by Robert Ludlum

Also published: A Bend in the River by V.S. Naipul, Sophie’s Choice by William Styron

1980: The Covenant by James A. Michener

1981: Noble House by James Clavell

Also published: Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie

1982: E.T. the Extraterrestrial Storybook by William Kotzwinkle

1983: Return of the Jedi Storybook by Joan D. Vinge

Also published: Ironweed by William Kennedy

1984: The Talisman by Stephen King and Peter Straub

1985: The Mammoth Hunters by Jean M. Auel

1986: It by Stephen King

1987: The Tommyknockers by Stephen King

1988: The Cardinal of the Kremlin by Tom Clancy

1989: Clear and Present Danger by Tom Clancy

1990: The Plains of Passage by Jean M. Auel

1991: Scarlett: The Sequel to Margaret Mitchell’s “Gone with the Wind” by Alexandra Ripley

1992: Dolores Claiburne by Stephen King

1993: The Bridges of Madison County by James Robert Waller

1994: The Chamber by John Grisham

1995: The Rainmaker by John Grisham

1996: The Runaway Jury by John Grisham

1997: The Partner by John Grisham

1998: The Street Lawyer by John Grisham

1999: The Testament by John Grisham

2000: The Brethern by John Grisham

2001: Desecration by Jerry B. Jenkins and Tim LaHaye

2002: The Summons by John Grisham

2003: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling

2004: The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown

2005: The Broker by John Grisham

2006: For One More Day by Mitch Albom

2007: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling

2008: The Appeal by John Grisham

2009: The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown

2010: The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest by Stieg Larsson

2011: The Litigators by John Grisham

2012: Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James

*Bestseller also on list of Top 100 novels

Art: The Bibliophilist’s Haunt or Creech’s Bookshop by William Fettes Douglas