Everything Electric Literature Accomplished In 2024

For the 15,000 people who visit our site every day (3.5 million per year), reading Electric Lit costs nothing. For the 1,500 writers who submitted their work to us this year, submission also costs nothing. 

And yet Electric Lit is not free. 

If you read Electric Literature, you already know what we are about: supporting writers and making their work as accessible as possible. Our recent awards, success stories, and many accomplishments in this effort are detailed below. We’re driven by the unshakeable belief that stories matter and literature has the power to change the world.

Electric Literature is a nonprofit organization with 8 staff members and 3 paid interns. We publish 15 articles per week—essays, reading lists, short stories, flash fiction, poetry, graphic narratives, interviews, and criticism—by over 500 writers per year. 

Our work costs $500,000 annually, and last year, 33% of that was donated by 2,000 of our readers—people like you! The average donation of $65 made a difference. We depend on you to keep the lights on.

Electric Literature may be free to read, but the costs are real and going up. We need to raise $25,000 by December 31, 2024 to keep Electric Literature going into next year. In these uncertain times, the only thing I know for sure is that we cannot afford to take the organizations and institutions we care about for granted. If the continued existence of Electric Literature means something to you, please make a contribution today. 

Electric Literature’s Accomplishments in 2024

• Both/And, EL’s groundbreaking essay series by trans writers of color, is going to be a book! Edited by Denne Michele Norris and featuring new essays by Raquel Willis, J Wortham, Akwaeke Emezi, and more, Both/And is forthcoming from HarperOne in August 2025.

• Through our Banned Books USA initiative, Electric Literature gave away 2,362 banned books to readers in Florida, and partnered with 16 local organizations to distribute them to vulnerable populations, including LGBTQ youth.

• We increased the number of articles we publish by 50%, from 10 to 15 posts per week. We published 462 writers and counting, leading to other significant career opportunities. For example, Taisya Kogan told us that after her very first publication, “Mrs. Morrison Corrects Her Obituary,” went up on Electric Literature, she received emails from not one, not two, but three agents.

• Kristopher Jansma adapted his popular Unfinished Business column into a book, Revisionaries: What We Can Learn from the Lost, Unfinished, and Just Plain Bad Work of Great Writers.

• Last year, Electric Literature made its debut in Best American Short Stories with three stories, a historic first for any online magazine. This year we have two, “Phenotype” by Alexandra Chang and “Extinction” by Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi. Lauren Groff also selected “Quantum Voicemail” by Kristen Iskandrian and “Chicken-Flavored and Lemon-Scented” by Katherine Heiny (now in production to become a TV show) as distinguished stories. “Didi” by Amber Caron was selected by Amor Towles as an O’Henry Prize-winning story. Wesley Morris selected Autumn Fourkiller’s Both/And essay “I Am Three Things a Woman Should Never Be” as a distinguished essay in Best American Essays 2024.

• We celebrated EL’s 15th anniversary at the Masquerade of the NEON Death, with hosts Emma Copley Eisenberg, Vanessa Chan, Deesha Philyaw, Clare Sestanovich, and Mateo Askaripour, all of whom are Electric Literature contributors.