On January 1, 2026, thousands of copyrighted literary works from 1930 entered the public domain in the United States. That means that in the U.S., authors can now incorporate these works into their own writing without permission and distribute them freely within the U.S.

Notable literary works from 1930 entering the public domain this year include:

• William Faulkner, As I Lay Dying
• Dashiell Hammett, The Maltese Falcon (the full book version)
• Agatha Christie, The Murder at the Vicarage (the first novel featuring Miss Marple)
• Carolyn Keene (pseudonym for Mildred Benson), the first four Nancy Drew books, beginning with The Secret of the Old Clock
• Watty Piper, The Little Engine That Could (the popular illustrated version, with drawings by Lois Lenski)
• T.S. Eliot, Ash Wednesday
• Noël Coward, Private Lives
• Evelyn Waugh, Vile Bodies
• John Dos Passos, The 42nd Parallel
• Edna Ferber, Cimarron
• Dorothy L. Sayers, Strong Poison
• W. Somerset Maugham, Cakes and Ale
• Arthur Ransome, Swallows and Amazons
• Olaf Stapledon, Last and First Men
• Bertrand Russell, The Conquest of Happiness
• Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents (in the original German)
• Elizabeth Coatsworth, The Cat Who Went to Heaven (Newbery Award winner)
• William H. Elson, Elson Basic Readers (featuring the first appearances of Dick and Jane)

These works showcase the remarkable literary diversity of 1930, including modernist masterpieces, Golden Age detective fiction, beloved children’s literature, science fiction, and foundational works of psychology and philosophy. Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying, with its title drawn from Homer’s Odyssey, continues to demonstrate how artists build upon the public domain to create new works. The novel’s experimental stream-of-consciousness narrative, told through fifteen different characters, cemented Faulkner’s reputation as a literary innovator.

This year also marks a golden moment for mystery lovers: we now have the complete Maltese Falcon (last year brought us the serialized magazine version) alongside Christie’s first Miss Marple novel, introducing one of detective fiction’s most beloved sleuths. And for generations of young readers, the first four Nancy Drew mysteries are now free to adapt and reimagine.

Beyond traditional literature, 1930 introduced several iconic characters through cartoons and comic strips that are also entering the public domain in the U.S.:

• Max and Dave Fleischer’s Betty Boop, who first appeared in the cartoon Dizzy Dishes
• Disney’s Rover (later renamed Pluto)
• Chic Young’s Blondie and Dagwood from the Blondie comic strips
• Additional Mickey Mouse cartoons and comic strips

These characters join the growing roster of recent public domain entrants, including Popeye, Tintin, the original Mickey Mouse, and Winnie-the-Pooh.

It’s worth noting that only the original 1930 incarnations of these characters are entering the public domain this year. Betty Boop, for instance, still had subtle dog ears in her first appearance—she was originally designed as a girlfriend for an animated dog named Bimbo. Her fully human form came later.

Please keep in mind that these books and characters may still be under copyright elsewhere in the world, as copyright terms for older works in other countries generally differ from U.S. terms. If you want to incorporate them in a new work published overseas, you should check the copyright in the relevant country.