The Library of America compiles the list yearly, and while the names in the top spots might jockey for position occasionally, it is usually a list that doesn’t change very much. The list began in 1982, and is based on sales through multiple venues.
Here is the list:
- Thomas Jefferson: Writings [1984]
- Mark Twain: Mississippi Writings [1982]
- Abraham Lincoln: Speeches & Writings 1832-1865 [two volumes, 1989]
- Walt Whitman: Poetry & Prose [1982]
- Henry David Thoreau: A Week, Walden, The Maine Woods, Cape Cod[1985]
- The Debate on the Constitution [two volumes, 1993]
- Robert Frost: Collected Poems, Prose and Plays [1995]
- Ulysses S. Grant: Memoirs and Selected Letters [1990]
- Ralph Waldo Emerson: Essays & Lectures [1983]
- Flannery O’Connor: Collected Works [1988]
- Edgar Allan Poe: Poetry & Tales [1984]
- Thomas Paine: Collected Writings [1995]
- Jack London: Novels & Stories [1982]
- William Faulkner: Novels 1930–1935 [1985]
- Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman [1990]
You can view last year’s list by following this link.