Authorship
Book counts grouped by author gender.
The graph illustrates that of the 30 books considered essential reading, 80% have male authors.
Number of Pages
Page counts.
This graph shows the page count for each book. Notably, Russian authors tended to produce particularly long works.
Time
Distribution of publication years.
Most titles cluster in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, a period often considered the foundation of the modern literary canon. Ancient and contemporary works appear more sparsely, underscoring the canon’s historical focus.