For a French-leaning list I’m surprised not to see Memoirs of Hadrian, “often considered the best French novel of the 20th century”, per the recent LRB review. https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v47/n10/joanna-biggs/beneath...

I agree, though the list contains "L'œuvre au noir", another wonderful novel by Marguerite Yourcenar.

I think some of the books on this list had very few readers, but were selected because of their relative fame among a list of 200 books. For instance, how many people have read the full "Gulag archipelago"? Or writings by Lacan or Barthes? Or the "Journal" by Jules Renard?