The Works of Aphra Behn, Volume I vs Autobiography of a Yogi
Both counted from their full texts, the same way, on the same day.
582words between them — 2 min of it
The Works of Aphra Behn, Volume I is longer — 155,359 words against 154,777 for Autobiography of a Yogi, a difference of 582 words or about 2 min of extra reading. Autobiography of a Yogi is the harder read, at grade 9.8 against 4.
SOURCE·Project Gutenberg full texts·both editions counted the same way·REVIEWED JUL 2026
Side by side
| The Works of Aphra Behn, Volume I | Autobiography of a Yogi | |
|---|---|---|
| Author | Behn, Aphra | Yogananda, Paramahansa |
| Words | 155,359 | 154,777 |
| Reading time at 250 wpm | 10h 21m | 10h 19m |
| Unique words | 12,002 | 14,983 |
| Sentences | 15,441 | 8,540 |
| Average sentence length | 10.1 words | 18.1 words |
| Reading grade | 4 | 9.8 |
| Reading ease | 84.1 | 57.3 |
| Long words | 7% | 13.8% |
Highlighted cells are the larger figure — except reading ease, where higher means easier.
SOURCE·Project Gutenberg full texts·both editions, same counting rule·REVIEWED JUL 2026
How this is worked out
- Both texts are counted the same way, from the same source, with Gutenberg's header and licence footer struck first.
- The gap is stated in words and then in time at 250 words a minute — the rate is printed because a duration without one cannot be checked.
- Difficulty is compared on Flesch–Kincaid grade, which reads sentence and word length only. It cannot see irony or dialect, so treat it as a measure of surface, not of effort.
gap = |155,359 − 154,777| = 582 words 582 ÷ 250 wpm = 2 min of extra reading
The second question
Which is longer, The Works of Aphra Behn, Volume I or Autobiography of a Yogi?
The Works of Aphra Behn, Volume I is longer — 155,359 words against 154,777 for Autobiography of a Yogi, a difference of 582 words or about 2 min of extra reading. Autobiography of a Yogi is the harder read, at grade 9.8 against 4.
Colophon
Both figures computed from Project Gutenberg plain-text editions — ebook no. 21339 and no. 7452 — and from no other source. Neither book’s text is set on this site.
SOURCE·Project Gutenberg full texts·US public domain·REVIEWED JUL 2026
Word counts and reading levels are computed from a specific public-domain edition and will differ from other editions and from other counting methods — see the method page.
