Checked out: Here are the Brooklyn Public Library’s most-borrowed books of all time

By Brooklyn Magazine Staff

To celebrate its 125th anniversary, Brooklyn Public Library has been releasing a list of its most-borrowed books of all time over the past few weeks. It’s probably the only list where Dr. Seuss, George Orwell and Voltaire all sit comfortably side-by-side.

And it is perhaps fitting that Brooklyn’s most-borrowed book written by a Brooklynite: 1963’s “Where the Wild Things Are,” by author and illustrator Maurice Sendak, tops the library’s list of its most checked-out books ever.

Born in 1928 to Jewish immigrant parents from Poland, Sendak illustrated more than 150 books during his career. He was also a stage and costume designer in the later part of his life. He lived in Brooklyn for most of list before moving to Connecticut in 1972. Sendak, who died in 2012, has a foundation that nurtures young artists and writers.

The story is about a rambunctious boy that’s sent to his room after misbehaving at dinner. There, he befriends the “wild things” who take him on an imaginary (or is it?) adventure.

And the #1 Most Borrowed Book in BPL History is…
“Where the Wild Things Are” by Maurice Sendak🎉. Thank you for your endless support and for tuning in to our Top 125 Countdown. And to all of the authors named- THANK YOU for such incredible contributions to the literary world. pic.twitter.com/yNo8HN1GKU

— Brooklyn Public Library (@BKLYNlibrary) November 14, 2022

“It really sums up the experience of a kid who’s been a little bit naughty,” Robin Lester Kenton, the vice president of marketing and communications for the library, told Gothamist. “The themes in that story are universal.”

In fact, a lot of the books on the list are children’s classics: In second place is  “The Snowy Day,” by Ezra Jack Keats, third is “The Cat in the Hat,” by Dr. Seuss and fourth is “A Christmas Carol,” from Charles Dickens. The fifth most-borrowed book is “Are You My Mother?” by PD Eastman.

To decipher the list, the library took into consideration a variety of factors, BPL recently said, including using “checkout and circulation data, historical bestseller lists and years since publication dates.” The process took about two months.

The BPL was established on November 30, 1896 and is now one of the largest library systems in the country. Here are their top 12 of all time. Click the image to be taken to the full list.