10 Great Books That Initially Flopped, Were Skewered by Critics, or Rose to Fame Slowly
Writing is a challenging business. Unfortunately, many authors don’t see success during their lifetime — or ever. For other authors, recognition is just a little slower to come by. The amount of great books that never really end up in the hands of readers is incalculable. From a reader’s perspective, this means you can always find diamonds in the rough and introduce your friends to books they’ve never heard of. From the writer's perspective, it’s yet another reason why you shouldn’t give up on writing the book of your dreams.
“The average American reads 12 or 13 books a year, but with over 3 million books in print, the choices they face are staggering. Despite the introduction of 100,000 new titles each year, only a tiny fraction of these attract a large enough readership to make The New York Times best-seller list.” — The Conversation
In the publishing world, if a book doesn’t skyrocket to fame, it’s often viewed as a flop. However, it’s worth noting that many books have a gradual rise to fame. Other books are catapulted long after their release by something completely unforeseen. The point is that you should never give up on your beloved book.
To prove that it can and does happen, continue reading these 10 great books that initially flopped or rose to fame slowly!
10 Great Books That Initially Flopped, Were Skewered by Critics, or Rose to Fame Slowly
10) Brave New World
The world wasn’t ready for Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World — at first. This dystopian masterpiece is regarded as timely and relevant today, but the critics of its era went so far as to call it a “heavy-handed piece of propaganda.” Huxley did experience a certain level of vindication during his lifetime and he penned a follow-up book Brave New World Revisited to compare the changes in the real world to what he wrote about in the original novel. On a side note, did you know that Aldous Huxley wrote an early screenplay for Disney’s 1951 version of Alice In Wonderland?
Where to get this book: Brave New World
9) The Lord of The Rings
It’s hard to imagine The Lord of The Rings as anything other than the absolute juggernaut of a franchise it’s become, but once upon a time, J.R.R. Tolkien’s seminal work was getting skewered by critics. Many revered publications like The New York Times criticized the series as being shallow and lacking in literary merit. The LoTR franchise stands strong in its own right and has served as inspiration for an entire subgenre of high fantasy like Game of Thrones.
Where to get this book: The Lord of The Rings
8) Chicken Soup for the Soul
Chicken Soup for the Soul has become the best-selling non-fiction series in the world, with over 130 million copies sold. However, before the series launched, it was rejected by more than 100 publishers. Jack Canfield, the author of the series, remembers that at one point nobody wanted to publish it and one of the main criticisms was in regards to the title.
Where to get this book: Chicken Soup for the Soul
7) Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone launched a book empire that’s climbing towards 500 million book sales and some of the highest-grossing films ever released. However, the book series was nearly lost in the slush piles of publishers and was rejected eight different times by those who did read it. It wasn’t until the eight-year-old daughter of Bloomsbury Publishing’s chairman read the first chapter and insisted her father let her read the rest of the story.
Where to get this book: Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone
6) The Great Gatsby
The Great Gatsby was initially seen as a disappointment compared to the young Fitzgerald’s earlier novels, which launched him into literary stardom. One critic even said, “Scott Fitzgerald’s new novel, The Great Gatsby is in form no more than a glorified anecdote, and not too probable at that. This story is obviously unimportant and, though, as I shall show, it has its place in the Fitzgerald canon, it is certainly not to be put on the same shelf with, say, This Side of Paradise. What ails it, fundamentally, is the plain fact that it is simply a story — that Fitzgerald seems to be far more interested in maintaining its surprise suspense than in getting under the skins of its people.”
Where to get this book: The Great Gatsby
5) Leaves of Grass
Whitman was an innovator. He was arguably America’s greatest poet and he pioneered free verse, the power of which was on full display in Leaves of Grass. The book was so controversial for its time that its “offensive” content got Whitman fired from his job. While one critic suggested Whitman should have never written Leaves of Grass and should have instead burned the manuscript, poet John Greenlead Whittier followed through and burned his own copy.
Where to get this book: Leaves of Grass
4) Slaughter-House Five
Slaughter-House Five is one of the most successful anti-war books of all time. Vonnegut managed to turn his own experiences in World War II into a part sci-fi, part historical fiction genre-bending masterpiece. However, not all of the critics initially viewed it that way. With one saying, “The short, flat sentences of which the novel is composed convey shock and despair better than an array of facts or effusive mourning. Still, deliberate simplicity is as hazardous as the grand style, and Vonnegut occasionally skids into fatuousness.”
Where to get this book: Slaughter-House Five
3) Animal Farm
Animal Farm, perhaps the most famous book critiquing communism, was rejected four times prior to going on to sell 20 million copies. The difficulty in publishing Animal Farm at the time, however, was that the USSR was a key ally of the UK during World War II. What makes the rejections a tad bit funnier, or at least reduces the blow, is that the author T.S. Eliot penned a rejection letter himself, writing, “We have no conviction that this is the right point of view from which to criticize the political situation at the current time.” Orwell secured a publisher just months after the Cold War ended.
Where to get this book: Animal Farm
2) On The Road
On the Road didn’t receive rave reviews right away. The traditional literary establishment wasn’t exactly sure what to make of it. The New York Times stated that On the Road was “not so much of a novel as a long affectionate lark inspired by the so-called ‘beat’ generation.”
Where to get this book: On the Road
1) The Handmaid’s Tale
The Handmaid’s Tale originally received scathing reviews, with one saying, “The most conspicuous lack, in comparison with the classics of the fearsome-future genre, is the inability to imagine a language to match the changed face of common life. No newspeak. And nothing like the linguistic tour de force of A Clockwork Orange — the brutal melting-down of current English and Slavic words that in itself tells the story of the dread new breed. The writing of The Handmaid’s Tale is undistinguished in a double sense, ordinary if not glaringly so, but also indistinguishable from what one supposed would be Margaret Atwood’s normal way of expressing herself in the circumstances. This is a serious defect, unpardonable maybe for the genre: a future that has no language invented for it lacks a personality. That must be why, collectively, it is powerless to scare.”
Where to get this book: The Handmaid’s Tale
