The 10 Most Popular Lit Hub Stories of 2021

Another year of Lit Hub has come and gone. We don’t have to tell you that this year was a weird one—the pandemic wore on, and the Literary Hub staff worked entirely from home. We still, however, endeavored to bring you the best in smart, engaged writing about books, from literary criticism to craft essays, from reading lists to deep dives, from up-to-the-minute commentary to ripped-from-the-archives gossip. So from our apartments to yours: Thanks for reading, and see you in the new year.

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Here are the pieces published in 2021 that you read and shared the most this year:

10.
Apparently the Brontës all died so early because they spent their lives drinking graveyard water.
by Emily Temple

In which Emily Temple stumbles upon a fun and disgusting fact about your favorite 19th-century literary sisters.

9.
On the Link Between Great Thinking and Obsessive Walking
by Jeremy DeSilva

In which Jeremy DeSilva looks to great writers, from Charles Darwin to Toni Morrison, to answer the question: Why does walking help us think?

8.
50 Very Bad Book Covers for Literary Classics
by Emily Temple

In which we are all delighted and appalled.

7.
The 36 Best (Old) Books We Read in 2021
by Lit Hub Staff

In which we recommend our favorite non-2021 books discovered (or re-read) in 2021.

6.
50 Great Classic Novels Under 200 Pages
by Emily Temple

In which Emily Temple recommends 50 short novels published before 1970 for you to enjoy.

5.
Walt Whitman’s letter to a female admirer is the nicest romantic rejection in history.
by Walker Caplan

In which Walt lets her down easy (and perhaps too subtly).

4.
The Cognitive Dissonance of America: Writing Through the Terror of Trumpland
by Brian Castleberry

In which Brian Castleberry contemplates the role of fiction in America’s “struggle over reality and power.”

3.
How an iconic Canadian rock band lured angry teens to the dark arts of Ayn Rand.
by Jonny Diamond

In which Jonny Diamond exposes Rush as an Ayn Rand gateway.

2.
Somebody finally fixed the ending of The Giving Tree.
by Emily Temple

In which Topher Payne addresses something that has been bothering us for years.

1.
Reminder: the most famous short story in American literature was written in one day.
by Walker Caplan

In which Walker Caplan looks at the drafting history of “The Lottery.”