Modern Library 100 Best Nonfiction
The Modern Library 100 Best Nonfiction was created in 1998 by the Modern Library. The list is what it considers to be the 100 best non-fiction books published since 1900.
The list included memoirs, textbooks, polemics, and collections of essays. A separate list of the 100 best novels of the 20th century was created the same year.
The following table shows the top ten books from the editors' list:
| # | Year | Title | Author |
| 1 | 1918 | The Education of Henry Adams | |
| 2 | 1902 | The Varieties of Religious Experience | |
| 3 | 1901 | Up From Slavery | |
| 4 | 1929 | A Room of One's Own | |
| 5 | 1962 | Silent Spring | |
| 6 | 1932 | Selected Essays, 1917–1932 | |
| 7 | 1968 | The Double Helix | |
| 8 | 1951 | Speak, Memory | |
| 9 | 1919 | The American Language | |
| 10 | 1936 | The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money |
A list chosen by readers was published separately by Modern Library in 1999. With close to 200,000 votes, The Virtue of Selfishness by Ayn Rand was selected as the best non-fiction book. Two other titles related to Rand – ' and ' – were No. 3 and No. 6, respectively. The Reader's Poll has been cited by Harry Binswanger, a longtime associate of Rand and promoter of her work, as representative of "the clash between the intellectual establishment and the American people." However, Jesse Walker, writing in Reason magazine, has observed that the Reader's Poll is an example of the unreliability of internet polls and their tendency to overemphasize the opinions of small but especially devoted groups.