Greatest Existential Fiction Books to Read

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Notes from Underground

This groundbreaking book draws a connection between the fiction of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and between the self-images each era embodied. The unidentified narrator is a senior official who has boldly withdrawn into an underground existence, making him one of literature’s most extraordinary figures. He scribbles a passionate, obsessive, self-contradictory story in total seclusion from a society that serves as a shattering critique of social utopianism and a proclamation of man’s fundamentally irrational essence. 

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

The author of this novel relates the tale of a young woman who falls in love with a man who is caught between his feelings for her and his unremitting philandering, as well as the narrative of one of his mistresses and her obediently devoted partner. This superb book intersperses physically far apart locations, insightful and lighthearted views, and a range of literary genres to establish itself as perhaps the crowning accomplishment of one of the all-time great authors. 

Thus Spoke Zarathustra

This classic Western literature is often regarded as the author’s finest effort. It features the famous debate between the German philosopher and the term God is dead, as well as his idea of Superman. In addition to outlining his Will to Power theory, the author criticizes Christian philosophy, particularly its conception of good and evil. 

The Moviegoer

The Moviegoer is Binx Bolling, a young stockbroker from New Orleans who, despite yearning for a spiritual deliverance he cannot bring himself to trust in, observes the world with the dispassionate gaze of a Bourbon Street dandy. On the night before his thirty-first birthday, he spends the time flirting with his assistants and watching movies, giving him the treasured moments missing from his everyday life. However, on a fateful Mardi Gras, Binx sets out on a foolish mission that angers his family, puts his weak cousin Kate in peril, and sends him spinning through the commotion of New Orleans’ French Quarter.

The Catcher in the Rye

An homage to teenage estrangement, this timeless work of coming-of-age literature captures the confused sensation of loss we experience as we grow up and the fundamental human urge for connection. As he pinballs about New York City in search of relief from the thieves at Pencey Prep, he is banged up by prostitution and cut down by ex-girlfriends while playing bull in dump motels and roaming alone through Central Park. 

The Stranger

The title character of the timeless literary masterpiece, Meursault, is an Algerian who murders someone after going to his mother’s funeral. His perception of the world, his range of emotions, and the overall follies of the period all work together to make for an engaging read. The narrative is aptly separated into two captivating pieces, both given from the viewpoint of Meursault. 

The Fall

The soul of Jean-Baptiste Clamence is tormented. He tells his tale to a random friend in an Amsterdam bar throughout several drunken nights. A riveting, self-loathing compendium of guilt, hypocrisy, and estrangement spills forth from this prosperous former attorney and ostensibly model citizen. This book does a fantastic job of capturing a man who has realized how meaningless his life is. However, beyond illustrating one man’s disenchantment, this book exposes the absurdity of the human situation because once gone, innocence can never be regained.

Demon

This grim classic portrays a world where the distinction between good and evil has faded. Two of the leaders of a Russian revolutionary cell are Pyotr Verkhovensky and Nikolai Stavrogin. They want to destabilize society, overthrow the Tsar, and take control of themselves. Together, they provide training for jihadists who will kill themselves if necessary to further their cause. Will their recruits be ready to murder a group member to hide their tracks when it appears that their oddball organization is about to be discovered?

Sophie’s World

When Sophie Amundsen, 14, gets home from school one day, she discovers two notes with the same question written on them: Who are you? And From where did the planet originate? From that captivating start, Sophie develops an obsession with inquiries that lead her well beyond the boundaries of her knowledge of her Norwegian community. 

Cat’s Cradle

With a little person as the main character, a calypso singer’s entire, original theology, and a view of the future that is both darkly fatalistic and hysterically amusing, it is an apocalyptic story about the ultimate fate of this planet. One of the original fathers of the atomic bomb, Dr. Felix Hoenikker, has left the world with a devastating legacy as he created ice-nine, a deadly toxin that has the power to freeze the entire world.