The Top 10 Most Read Books in the World

[sun surfer]

Originally Posted by dwig

It depends on how you count them.

If you want to consider LotR as a single book you can only count the number printed and read of that one volume with the lowest number printed/read. You can't total the printed/read numbers for the 3 volumes and have numbers that can be compared to single volume works. If 10million of each volume have been printed/read then the total for printed/read is 10million, not 30million.

I agree, and think that joining them by series is better than counting each one individually, so long as your criteria is used.

Otherwise, if the series were split and if we used this top 10 and assume it is correct, then 3-9 would probably be all Harry Potter books.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by bill_mchale

Just a thought, but while there are translations of the Koran in English and doubtless many other vernaculars around the world, I believe most muslims believe it should only be read in the original Arabic (i.e., 1300 year old Arabic). Since most muslims do not come from Arabic speaking countries, I wonder how many actually are truly literate in the Arabic that the Koran is written in.

--
Bill

Having numerous British Muslim friends, the answer to that, in the British Pakistani community at least, is "very few". But most British Muslims own "parallel" versions of the Koran, which have the Arabic text printed on one page, and an English translation on the facing page. Most Muslims of my acquantance can read the Koran in Arabic out loud (this is very easy to do, since Arabic is an entirely phonetic language), but can understand very little of the Arabic, other than certain "stock phrases".

[morriss003]

Actually I was referring to the King James Version which was a mistake on my part. Of course, it was not originally written in English, and neither was Chairman Mao's book. I'm probably correct in assuming that most copies of Chairman Mao's book were printed in Chinese, but in what language have most bibles been printed? Anyone know the answer to that? English, Spanish, some other language?

[carpetmojo]

Originally Posted by rhadin

:..............Not noted is whether bible = new or old testament or both or whether or not it includes the koran and the book of mormon.

"The Bible" is the term used for, well, "The Bible", i.e. the combination of both Testaments, Old and New.
They're called the old Testament and The New Testament........

Don't quite see how the Koran can be classed as part of "The Bible" - some shared characters and events, but different books for different religions.

The Torah and Tanakh, again, parts of "The Bible", but not called the Bible, and a different religion.

But the book of mormon ?
Now you really are 'aving a larf ........

The LOTR's far more entertaining................
And cheaper by far in the long run........

[bill_mchale]

Originally Posted by morriss003

Actually I was referring to the King James Version which was a mistake on my part. Of course, it was not originally written in English, and neither was Chairman Mao's book. I'm probably correct in assuming that most copies of Chairman Mao's book were printed in Chinese, but in what language have most bibles been printed? Anyone know the answer to that? English, Spanish, some other language?

If I had to make a stab at it, I would say probably English. The majority of Spanish speaking Christians are still Catholic and while us Catholics consider the Bible one of the cornerstone of our faith, studying it is not quite as important to a Catholic as it is to many Protestant denominations. Oh, and of course this is also based on the fact that English and Spanish are two of the most spoken/read languages in the world.

--
Bill

[DrNefario]

Shouldn't your bibles be in Latin if you're Catholic?

[forumshrew]

In my life I've read the New Testament over 100 times and the Old Testament probably 25. This isn't a brag because you don't know me and would never mention it to someone face to face (because it's personal and not a boast). Just a statement, because for me the Bible is the most exciting, comforting, life changing read. It is fresh and new each time.

[Xanthe]

The only book on that list that I've read is the Bible, and that's because I figured that I should read it completely at least once in my life.

I started and put down Gone With The Wind, The Lord of the Rings, and The Da Vinci Code uncompleted; I doubt that I'll attempt to read them again because they didn't hold my interest. I'm not interested at all in Harry Potter. I don't know anything about The Alchemist or Think And Grow Rich. Don't care what Chairman Mao had to say. Can't stand teenaged vampire stories so The Twilight Saga is out. Somehow never had to read the Anne Frank book in school.

Of that list, I think the justifiable books are the Bible, The Lord of the Rings, the Quotations from Chairman Mao, and the Diary of Anne Frank.

I'd probably add: the Koran, the Mahabharata, the Divine Comedy, The Odyssey, A Tale of Two Cities, Don Quixote

[Ninjalawyer]

I purchased and read The Da Vinci Code, making me part of the problem. I am so sorry, so very sorry. I swear, I only bought it because it was in the discount bin and I wanted to know what everyone found so interesting! As God as my witness, I swear I found the plot unbelievable and the characters less than two-dimensional!

[Latinandgreek]

Originally Posted by DrNefario

Shouldn't your bibles be in Latin if you're Catholic?

My bible is in Latin

Well, one of them is. I have about 5 or 6 of them, perhaps more. I am Catholic, but I'm not particularly religious. I do collect books though. Latin is compulsory here in most high schools (all of them except for trade schools actually), so I suppose that in theory many adults here in Croatia would be able to understand the Vulgate to some extent. I doubt that is the case in practice. (Interesting fact: Latin was the official language of the Croatian senate until 1847. Not so long ago!) I've never heard mass held in Latin here, but there is a church nearby that holds mass in Old Church Slavonic, which was once prohibited by the Pope in some places.

The only two books on the list that I haven't read are "Think and Grow Rich" and the "Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-Tung".

[caleb72]

I've read snippits of the Bible, slogged through the whole boring saga of Lord of the Rings and have Think and Grow Rich on my bookshelf at home. I've read quite a bit of that in the past.

I will never read Da Vinci Code or Twilight so I'll certainly never complete this list. The others - maybe.

[K. Molen]

Originally Posted by Catlady;2075247The two inclusions that really surprise me are [I

The Alchemist[/I], which I had no idea was such a phenomenon...

While it's a phenomenon either way you slice it, there's some conflicting sales numbers out there.

From Wikipedia:

Originally Posted by Wikipedia

According to AFP, it has sold more than 65 million copies in more than 160 countries, becoming one of the best-selling books in history. But according to the publisher HarperCollins, at the time of that paperback publication, all of Coelho's many books had sold 65 million copies total; according to the author's web site, twenty-one million copies of The Alchemist have been sold.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Alchemist_(novel)

[K. Molen]

On this topic, I find the Wikipedia entry List of best-selling books more interesting and more believable. This is what it has to say about religious texts:

Originally Posted by Wikipedia

Religious books, especially The Bible, the Qur'an and the Bhagavad Gita are probably the most-printed books, but it is nearly impossible to find reliable sales figures for them. Print figures are missing or unreliable since these books are produced by many different and unrelated publishers. Furthermore, many copies of the Bible, the Qur'an and the Bhagavad Gita are printed and given away free, instead of being sold. The same goes for some political books, such as the works of Mao Zedong or Adolf Hitler. Thus it is impossible to determine either the number printed, or the proportion of those printed that are sold. All such books have been excluded from this list for those reasons.

[arkietech]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Do you honestly believe that the Bible was "originally written in English"?

By King James

[David Munch]

Originally Posted by Belfaborac

I'm reasonably sure neither the bible, nor Mao's little red book originally came in English.... Anne Frank probably didn't write English either, come to think of it.

Neither is the Twilight saga, it is written in Female.