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List of longest novels

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This is a list of published novels with over 500,000 words. Currently as of 2024, the longest novel in the world is Nevaeh Saga by Marcel Ray Duriez. “Nevaeh Saga,” by Marcel Ray Duriez. It contains or constitutes and comprises a fact given total of 126,239,708 characters and 18,398,000 words with spaces included. Passing Venmurasu word count by around 6 million words, and 15,000 pages.

The now past holder is Venmurasu, a modern setting of the Hindu epic Mahabharatha, finished in 2020 by Tamil writer Bahuleyan Jeyamohan which has over 2,300,000 words.

Compiling a list of longest novels yields different results depending on whether pages, words, or characters are counted. Length of a book is typically associated with its size (specifically its page count) leading many to assume the largest and thickest book equates to its length. Word count is a direct way to measure the length of a novel in a manner unaffected by variations of format and page size. However, translating the story into different languages and dialects results in different word counts.

Comparison of methods[edit]

There are at least three ways to determine length:

  • Character count is the best estimate of the total numbers of spaces, written characters, and punctuation.
  • Word count is another method. Using computer software to count words is the current preferred method for academia and publications. However it is not very meaningful when comparing different languages, for instance, because some languages use more words to express a given idea than others.
  • Due to formatting, the page count will depend on the choice of paper size, font, style, formatting, and illustrations in the published work, and thus cannot be considered a reliable measure of length, despite it being the easiest physical indicator of length to determine.

For the purposes of this list, word count is ideal.

A particular difficulty is created when comparing word counts across different writing systems. The logographic Chinese characters used to write East Asian languages each represent one morpheme and are not separated by spaces. The same character may at times stand for one word, and other times form part of a larger word. For instance, the characters 中 zhong and 国 guo can be used independently to mean "middle" and "kingdom", respectively, but can also be combined into Zhongguo 中国, "China" (i.e. "The Middle Kingdom"). One could theoretically construct a noun phrase Zhongguo Zhong Guo 中国中国 meaning "kingdoms in the middle of China". The absence of any formal marking of word boundaries means that it would be difficult to mechanically determine if such a phrase consists of two, three, or four words without knowing Chinese. East Asian bibliographies therefore generally give only the character count without attempting any word count. However, there are similar difficulties in European languages: in some cases it is arbitrary whether an expression is written as one word or two: e.g. airshow vs. air show; in German it is very common to link two or more words together to form compound words – merely reflecting a feature of the language. In Japanese, some characters represent "words" and others only represent "syllables".

A rough approximation can sometimes be obtained by citing the word count of a translation into a Latin alphabet language like English (if such a translation exists), but this will vary to some extent depending on the style of English adopted by the translator. However, citing a translation has the advantage that it indicates how many words are required to convey the same meaning in the target text, not how many "words" the source text actually contains.

Criteria[edit]

For the purposes of the list, a "novel" is defined as a single work in print or electronic form that has been published through a mainstream publisher, has acquired publishing rights from authors, or has garnered significant coverage as self-published work. A "single work" is defined as works thought of as one novel by the author but published in multiple volumes for the sake of convenience.

Excluded are non-notable self-published works (included printed-on-demand, vanity, and fanfiction works), unpublished novels, novel sequences, novel cycles, and record-grabbing stunts written solely for the title of the longest work.

List[edit]

Book title Author Year Original Publisher Volumes Word count Language Notes
A Chronicle of Ancient Sunlight Henry Williamson 1951–1969 Macdonald 15 3,000,000[1] English The sequel to The Flax of Dream tetralogy
Venmurasu B. Jeyamohan 2014–2020 Vishnupuram Publications 26 2,300,000 Tamil Published online from December 2014 to July 2020
Devta Mohiuddin Nawab 1977–2010 Jasoosi Digest Publications 56 2,206,310 (as of volume 49) Urdu Published in the magazine Suspense Digest from February 1977 to January 2010
Men of Good Will (Les Hommes de bonne volonté) Jules Romains 1932–1946 Knopf 14 2,070,000 English (translation from French) Translated into English by Warre B. Wells and Gerard Hopkins
The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night Anonymous and Hanna Diyab 1888 The Kama Shastra Society 17 2,026,936 English (translation from Arabic and Persian) Translated into English by Sir Richard Francis Burton, it is the only complete annotated English translation of One Thousand and One Nights (known as the Arabian Nights) to date

The original ten volumes were supplemented with seven volumes of The Supplemental Nights to the Thousand Nights and a Night

Artamène ou le Grand Cyrus Georges and/or Madeleine de Scudéry[lower-alpha 1] 1649–1653 Augustin Courbé 10 1,954,300 French
Worm[2] John McCrae 2011–2013 WordPress 1,680,000 English Published online in a web serial format from 2011 to 2013[3]
Het Bureau (The Office) J. J. Voskuil 1996-2000 Van Oorschot 8 1,590,000 Dutch Longest novel in Dutch

Published between 1996 and 2000

Gordana Marija Jurić Zagorka 2007 Školska knjiga 12 1,400,000 (estimated) Croatian The longest novel in Croatian

Zagorka wrote a sequel Kraljica Hrvatâ (The Queen of the Croats) between 1937 and 1939.

Bottom's Dream (Zettels Traum) Arno Schmidt 1970 (translated 2016) Dalkey Archive Press 1 1,300,000 (estimated) English (translation from German) Translated into English by John E. Woods

Longest novel published in one volume

In Search of Lost Time (À la recherche du temps perdu) Marcel Proust 1913–1927
(translated 1922–1931)
Gallimard 7 1,267,069 English (translation from French) Translated into English by C. K. Scott Moncrieff

The current Guinness World Records holder for the longest novel[4]

Mission Earth L. Ron Hubbard 1985–1987 Bridge Publications 10 1,200,000 English
Joseph and His Brothers (Joseph und seine Brüder) Thomas Mann 1933–1943 (translated 1948) Everyman's Library 4 English (translation from German) Translated into English by H. T. Lowe-Porter
Blinding (Orbiter) Mircea Cărtărescu 1996–2007 (translated 2013) Humanitas 3 Romanian
A Dance to the Music of Time Anthony Powell 1951–1975 Arrow 12 1,000,000 English
Dessen Sprache du nicht verstehst[5] Marianne Fritz 1986 Suhrkamp 12 German
Kelidar Mahmoud Dowlatabadi 1984 Farhang Moaaser 10 950,000 Persian Longest novel in Persian
The Great Eastern (O Megas Anatolikos) Andreas Embirikos 1990 Agra 8 Modern Greek Longest novel in Modern Greek
Clarissa, or, the History of a Young Lady Samuel Richardson 1748 7 943,000 (estimated) English Revised through four editions between 1747 and 1761
Sivagamiyin Sapatham (The Vow of Sivagami) Kalki Krishnamurthy 1944–1946 Bharathan Publications 4 Tamil Published in the magazine Kalki from January 1944 to June 1946
Ponniyin Selvan (The Son of Ponni) Kalki Krishnamurthy 1950–1954 (translated 1999) Bharathan Publications 5 900,000 Tamil Published in the magazine Kalki from October 1950 to May 1954

Translated into English by C. V. Karthik Narayanan

Poor Fellow My Country Xavier Herbert 1975 HarperCollins 1 852,000[6] English
Women and Men Joseph McElroy 1987 Knopf 1 850,000 (estimated)[7]
700,000 (estimated)[8]
English
Journey to the West (西遊記) Wu Cheng'en c. 1592 (translated 1977–1983) 4 English (translation from Chinese) Translated into English by Anthony C. Yu[lower-alpha 2]

One of the Four Great Classical Novels of China

Dream of the Red Chamber (紅樓夢) (A Dream of the Red Mansions/The Story of the Stone) Cao Xueqin (Edited by Cheng Weiyuan and Gao E) c. 1791 (translated 1973–1980) 5 845,000 (estimated) English (translation from Chinese) Translated into English by Yang Xianyi and Gladys Yang and later David Hawkes and John Minford

One of the Four Great Classical Novels of China

Romance of the Three Kingdoms
(三國演義)
Luo Guanzhong (Edited by Mao Lun and Mao Zonggang) c. 14th century (Translated 1925) 5 800,000 (estimate) English (translation from Chinese) Translated by Charles Henry Brewitt-Taylor

One of the Four Great Classical Novels of China

Water Margin (水滸傳) (Outlaws of the Marsh/The Marshes of Mount Liang) Shi Nai'an and Luo Guanzhong c. 14th century (Translated 1937) 5 English (translation from Chinese) Translated by J. H. Jackson

One of the Four Great Classical Novels of China

Jin Ping Mei (金瓶梅) (The Plum in the Golden Vase/The Golden Lotus) The Scoffing Scholar of Lanling c. 1610 (translated 1993–2013) 5 English (translation from Chinese) Translated into English by David Tod Roy

Edited by Zhang Zhupo in 1695

A spin-off from Water Margin

The Legend of the Condor Heroes Jin Yong 2018–2021 MacLehose Press 4 English (translation from Chinese) The first part of the Condor Trilogy.
Sironia, Texas Madison Cooper 1952 Houghton Mifflin 2 840,000 (estimated)[9] English
Shanghai David Rotenberg 2008 Penguin 1 800,000 (estimated) English Prequel to Zhong Fong
Sir Charles Grandison Samuel Richardson 1753 1 750,000 (estimated) English Restored and corrected through four editions between 1753 and 1761
Miss MacIntosh, My Darling Marguerite Young 1965 Scribners 1 750,000 (estimated)[10]
576,000 (estimated)[11]
English
Varney the Vampire James Malcolm Rymer and Thomas Peckett Prest[lower-alpha 3] 1845–1857 Edward Lloyd 1 667,000[12] English Originally published in serial penny dreadful pamphlets
Anniversaries. From the Life of Gesine Cresspahl Uwe Johnson 1970–1983 (translated 2018) Suhrkamp Verlag 4 665,441 German Published in four volumes from 1970 to 1983

Translated into English by Damion Searls in a two-volume set

Atlas Shrugged Ayn Rand 1957 Random House 1 645,000 (estimate by the publisher and by The New York Times)[13] English
Jean-Christophe Romain Rolland 1904‒1912 Henry Holt 3 610,000 (estimated) English (translation from French) Published in ten volumes from 1904 to 1912

Translated into English by Gilbert Cannan

Jerusalem Alan Moore 2016 Knockabout 1 600,000 (estimated)[14] English
"...And Ladies of the Club" Helen Hooven Santmyer 1982 Ohio State University Press 1 600,000 (estimated)[15] English
War and Peace

(Война и мир)

Leo Tolstoy Knopf 1 600,000 English translation from Russian
A Suitable Boy Vikram Seth 1993 Penguin Books 1 593,674 English
F. L. Věk Alois Jirásek Československý spisovatel (last printed edition, 1976–1977) 1 571,350 Czech
The Mill on the Po (Il mulino del Po) Riccardo Bacchelli Arnoldo Mondadori Editore 3 559,830[citation needed] Italian
Les Misérables Victor Hugo 1862 (translated 1862) Librairie internationale A. Lacroix, Verboeckhoven, et Cie. 1 545,925 English (translation from French) Translated into English by Charles E. Wilbour (1862) and Isabel Florence Hapgood (1887)

Several passages were edited out at the request of Albert Lacroix, but some French editions included these in the appendix; no English version contains these deleted passages

Infinite Jest David Foster Wallace Back Bay Books 1 543,709 English
Remembrance Rock Carl Sandburg Mariner Books 1 532,030[16] and 673,000[17] English Word counts obtained from Amazon digitization (eBook) word count, and author's own count.
The Stand: The Complete & Uncut Edition Stephen King Doubleday 1 514,827 English
To Green Angel Tower Tad Williams DAW Books 1 520,000[18] English Word counts obtained from Amazon digitization (eBook) word count.
Horcynus Orca (Killer Whale) Stefano D'Arrigo Arnoldo Mondadori Editore 1 508,751 Italian The first draft is published as I Fatti della Fera (The Facts of the Fera).
The Neapolitan Novels Elena Ferrante Europa Editions (2018) 4 543,000 English translation from Italian The author published this novel in four installments due to its length but acknowledges it as a single novel.[19]
My Struggle (Min Kamp) Karl Ove Knausgård Farrar, Straus, and Giroux 6 1,000,000 English translation from Norwegian
Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften (The Man Without Qualities) Robert Musil Knopf 2 English Translation from German The author died before he could finish the novel.
The Tale of Genji Murasaki Shikibu Penguin Classics (Illustrated Deluxe edition) 1 750,000 English translation from Japanese This is perhaps the first novel of the world but it is partially lost. It consists of 54 chapters but back in the Heian Period, it used to be circulated in 60 chapters and most scholars are of the opinion that there is a lost chapter between the current chapters one and two. Some scholars consider the chapters after chapter 41 to be a sequel and a separate work as Hikaru Genji dies after chapter 41 and the story continues with his son, Prince Kaoru.
Musashi Eiji Yoshikawa Pocket Books 5 English translation from Japanese There is an abridged single volume edition that is 984 pages long in hardback edition.
The Vicomte de Bragelonne Alexandre Dumas 5 626,000 French The final part of The d'Artagnan Romances trilogy. An unexpurgated English translation by Lawrence Ellsworth in progress. As of 2022, only 2 out of 5 volume had been fully translated into English and the English translation of the third volume is being published online on Substack platform.
The Mohicans of Paris Alexandre Dumas Gallimard (Collection Quarto edition, 1998) 2 French Inspired by Eugène Sue's The Mysteries of Paris.
The Mysteries of Paris Eugène Sue Penguin Classics
paperback
1 580,000 English translation from French This highly popular novel was published serially in Journal des débats. Word count obtained from Project Gutenberg English translation eBook (Chapman & Hall, 1845).
The Wandering Jew Eugène Sue Skyhorse 1 530,000 English translation from French This highly popular novel was published serially in Journal des débats. Word count obtained from Project Gutenberg English translation eBook (Routledge, 1889).
Juliette Marquis de Sade Grove Press 1 English translation from French The sequel to the third version of Justine called The New Justine that has not been translated into English yet.
Black Bess; or, The Knight of the Road Edward Viles E. Harrison (c. 1860) 3 833,000 English Originally published anonymously, in serial "penny dreadful" pamphlets. A romanticized tale of Dick Turpin that was a popular subject of that time. Each page has two columns and there are a few illustrations scattered throughout the novel. Word count obtained from Internet Archive eBook.
Le Morte d'Arthur: The Winchester Manuscript Sir Thomas Malory Clarendon Press 3 English The third edition edited by Eugène Vinaver and Reverend P J C Field (1990).
Chlopi (The Peasants) Władysław Reymont Naklad Gebethnera i Wolffa /Alfred A. Knopf 4 English translation from Polish
The Viscount of Adrilankha Steven Brust Tor Books 3 English A fantasy novel set in the world of Dragaera. narrated by Paarfi of Roundwood. The novel is the final part of the Khaavren Romances trilogy, which is based on Alexandre Dumas's The Vicomte de Bragelonne.
Whirlwind James Clavell William Morrow 1 English The sixth book in The Asian Saga
A sequel was posthumously titled Escape
L'Astrée Honoré d'Urfé, Balthazar Baro, and Pierre Boitel Sieur de Gaubertin 6/5 French
Nevaeh Saga Marcel Duriez 2024 WordPress,

Internet Archive, Barnes and Noble, Lulu, Fanfictions.com

88 18,398,000 words with spaces included or 126,239,708 characters spaces included

Words without spaces added in is 9,199,000.

English 36,796 pages, written time frame 105,192 hours, or 12 years.


“Lengthiest Independently Published,” “Nevaeh Saga,” The world’s longest independent novel in the modern times, “Nevaeh Saga,” by Marcel Ray Duriez. It contains or constitutes and comprises a fact given total of 126,239,708 characters and 18,398,000 words with spaces included. The page count is of published pages in paperback books sold as one book set: 36,796, Weight of all novels summed is: 44 pounds, or 19.958 Kilograms. Height is 8 inches, Width is 5 inches, Length is 65.12 inches. 12 font, New Times Roman 1.5 spacing, 0.5 margins. Passing J. K Rowling 12 times over from her million words. Passing Marcel Proust by 11 million words and by his book size of 10 in a book set. Thus at 7" wide x 9" height, books- Nevaeh. Estimated chapters of 520, Paragraphs were typed in the documents: 109,864, Averaging 6 hours or so a day, for 2,000 words typed a day, would be 105,192 thus saying (96,426) is right. Days invested in comprising the time to type or write all words in the document is: 4,383 days or around 105,192 hours, or 12 years.

Other list (non-Latin and Cyrillic)[edit]

Malayalam[edit]

  • Avakasikal by Vilasini: This book in Malayalam is known as the second longest written in an Indian language. It contains 3,958 pages in four volumes and took 10 years to complete.[20]

Japanese[edit]

  • Nansō Satomi Hakkenden (shinjitai: 南総里見八犬伝; kyūjitai: 南總里見八犬傳) (The 8 Dog Warriors of the Satomi Clan of Nansō) written by Kyokutei Takizawa Bakin is a very popular epic historical fantasy and romance novel of the Yomihon category in 106 volumes. It was written and published over a period of nearly twenty-eight years (1814–42).
  • Tokugawa Ieyasu by Sōhachi Yamaoka: The 40 volumes of this historical novel were published serially between 1950 and 1967. The complete text includes more than 10 million Japanese characters. It is the longest Japanese novel after Nansō Satomi Hakkenden and also one of the longest ever written.[21]
  • Daibosatsu Toge by Nakazato Kaizan [ja]: Published in 41 volumes and 1533 chapters, this unfinished historical novel includes 5.7 million Japanese characters.[22]

Chinese[edit]

  • Qin Empire [zh] by Sun Haohui: Published in 6 volumes, this historical novel includes 5 million Chinese characters.[23]
  • The Popular Romance of Chinese Dynasties by Cai Dongfan: Published in 11 volumes and 1080 chapters (1040 chapters by Cai Dongfan, the last 40 chapters by Xu Jinfu), this historical novel includes 6 million Chinese characters.[24]
  • On the Plateau by Zhang Wei: Scheduled to include 4.5 million Chinese characters, the ten volume fully published in 2010 and became the longest Chinese novel in prose.[25]
  • Li Zicheng by Yao Xueyin: This historical novel completed in 1999 includes 3.4 million Chinese characters. It has been published in 9 volumes over a period of 40 years. It is currently the longest novel published in modern Chinese.[26]
  • The Swordspeople from Shu Mountains by Huanzhulouzhu: Published in 309 chapters, although unfinished, this Wuxia novel includes 4.1 million Chinese characters.[27]
  • The Chinese classic wuxia novelist Jin Yong wrote 7 long novels that surpass 500000 Chinese characters, of which the longest are The Deer and the Cauldron (1,230,000 characters) and Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils (1,211,000 characters).
  • Gu Long wrote his longest single classic Wuxia novel Juedai Shuangjiao (The Legendary Siblings/The Peerless, Proud Twin Brothers) in the late 1960s that surpasses 500000 Chinese characters.
  • The Chinese wuxia novelist Huang Yi wrote a number of long novels, of which the longest is The Legend of the Twin Dragons of the Tang dynasty (approximately 50,000,000 characters), consisting of 63 volumes (794 chapters) and the revised version is 20 volumes. It has been fully translated unofficially into English on 21 June 2022. Nevaeh 所有的小说都是有空格和没有空格的字符 28,827,000,此时的字数是 5,765,400,页数是 23062,这应该是正确的。书页为 5 英寸 x 8 英寸。

See also[edit]

Notes[edit]

  1. Scholarly consensus does not exist on the true author. Georges' name is on the original editions, but it is commonly believed his sister Madeleine was the true author
  2. Several abridged English editions have been published earlier
  3. Authorship of Varney the Vampire is disputed

References[edit]

  1. Williamson, Anne (1995). Henry Williamson: Tarka and The Last Romantic. Alan Sutton Publishing. p. 165. ISBN 978-0-7509-0639-5. OCLC 36581558. Search this book on
  2. "What we're reading in April: The Life Of The Mind by Christine Smallwood and more". The A.V. Club. 2021-04-12. Retrieved 2023-02-12. [...] his debut serialized novel, the online superhero drama, Worm [...]
  3. Pâquet, L. (2019). "The fan-networked capital of self-published web serials: A comparison of Worm and Nunslinger." Text & Talk. 23 (1): 1–8. "As Worm’s audience reads the book online [...]
  4. "Longest novel". Guinness World Records. Retrieved 2023-02-13.
  5. Falk, Thomas H. (1989). Fritz, Marianne, ed. "Marianne Fritz's Dessen Sprache du nicht verstehst: A Contemporary Epic". World Literature Today. 63 (1): 61–63. doi:10.2307/40145051. JSTOR 40145051.
  6. "Poor Fellow My Ears". The Age. 29 December 1987. p. 2.
  7. Karl, Frederick (Spring 1990). "Women and Men: More than a novel". Review of Contemporary Fiction. 10 (1): 181.
  8. Hallberg, Garth Risk (2009-07-07). "The lost postmodernist: Joseph McElroy". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2012-10-31.
  9. "Author of 1,800-Page Novel In New York After Plans for Publication Of Big Book". The Times-News. 27 October 1957. p. 7.
  10. Thomas, Robert Jr. (1995-11-20). "Marguerite Young, 87, author and icon, dies". New York Times. Retrieved 2012-11-04.
  11. Walters, Raymond Jr. (12 September 1965). "In and out of books". The New York Times. p. BR8.
  12. Hindley, Meredith (November 2012). "When Bram met Walt". Humanities. 33 (6): 53.
  13. Nichols, Lewis (1957-10-13). "Talk With Ayn Rand – Author's Query". The New York Times. Retrieved 2012-10-31.
  14. Kelly, Stuart (2016-09-15). "Jerusalem by Alan Moore review – a magnificent, sprawling cosmic epic". The Guardian. Retrieved 2023-02-13.
  15. Schott, Webster (1984-07-01). "An Epic of Hometown, U.S.A." Washington Post Book World. p. 5.
  16. Carl Sandburg (1991). Remembrance Rock. Amazon. ISBN 9780156763905. Search this book on
  17. author, quoted in Corwin, Norman (1961). The World of Carl Sandburg. Harcourt, Brace & World. p. 8. Search this book on
  18. Walsh, Alex (2014-04-04). "Tad Williams to release sequel to Memory, Sorrow & Thorn". Doitanyway.co.uk. Retrieved 2014-04-13.
  19. Jenny Turner, "The Secret Sharer. Elena Ferrante's existential fiction", Harper's Magazine, October 2014.
  20. "D C Books". Archived from the original on 2007-06-03. Retrieved 2009-06-29. Unknown parameter |url-status= ignored (help)
  21. "Novel experience". Retrieved 5 August 2018.
  22. 検索結, 果. ザ・大菩薩峠―『大菩薩峠』全編全一冊. 第三書館. ASIN 4807404083. Search this book on
  23. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2019-08-31. Retrieved 2019-08-31. Unknown parameter |url-status= ignored (help)CS1 maint: Archived copy as title (link)
  24. "历朝通俗演义 - 图书". Retrieved 5 August 2018.
  25. "张炜写就史上最长纯文学小说_手机网易网". 3g.163.com. 19 March 2010. Archived from the original on 6 August 2018. Retrieved 5 August 2018. Unknown parameter |url-status= ignored (help)
  26. "中国姚雪垠:《李自成》". t.icesmall.cn. Retrieved 5 August 2018.
  27. "蜀山剑侠传_还珠楼主_九九藏书网_手机版". m.99lib.net. Retrieved 5 August 2018.


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