The 100 best history books from the United States

The foundational text of American constitutional theory, cited by the Supreme Court.

Required reading in American universities across sociology, African American studies, history, and literature departments, appearing on more syllabi than almost any other work of American nonfiction. Continuously in print since 1903, it appears on virtually every list of essential American books and is considered foundational to American intellectual history.

Maus is widely taught in schools and universities as a central Holocaust text and as the key work of the graphic novel, and it won a Pulitzer Prize special award in 1992 for the combined work. It is now standard in comics studies and memory studies.

Hemingway reduced fiction to one old man, one marlin, and the Gulf Stream, and proved that a story stripped to its barest elements could carry the weight of a parable about endurance, craft, and the dignity of losing. The novella's final image — the skeleton of the great fish picked clean at the dock — is among the most perfectly earned symbols in American literature.

The standard English-language reference for classical Japanese literature; no comparable work has appeared since publication.

American Renaissance is credited with naming and founding the field — the 1850-55 period is still called 'the American Renaissance' because of this book, and it remains standard graduate reading in American literature and American Studies programs. It sits alongside Edmund Wilson's Patriotic Gore as one of the two or three books that created the discipline it now anchors.

Widely taught in universities and high schools as the defining Holocaust graphic memoir, Maus appears on hundreds of literature and history syllabi worldwide. It is listed on virtually every major 'essential reading' and 'greatest books' compilation that includes graphic literature, from the Modern Library to Time's All-TIME 100 Novels. While not on syllabi at the scale of Fitzgerald or Austen, it holds unique canonical status as the book that forced academia to take comics seriously.

Hiroshima is required reading in American journalism schools and widely taught in history, ethics, and literature courses across the country. NYU's journalism faculty voted it the finest piece of American journalism of the 20th century. The book has remained continuously in print since 1946 and appears on virtually every list of essential American nonfiction.

The standard account of Robert Moses and of how power works in American cities, assigned in urban planning, political science and journalism programmes. It appears on nearly every list of the best American nonfiction of the twentieth century.

The Feminine Mystique appears on hundreds of women's studies, American history, and sociology syllabi across the United States and internationally. Time magazine named it one of the 100 most important nonfiction books of the 20th century, and it features on Modern Library and similar 'essential nonfiction' lists. Its Wikipedia article exists in dozens of languages with substantial coverage of its reception and cultural impact.