Emily

Emily Dickinson wrote seventeen hundred poems in a white dress in an upstairs bedroom in Amherst, and Emily Brontë wrote Wuthering Heights with the wind beating against a Yorkshire parsonage — the name has been keeping literary company for a long time. It descends from the Roman family name Aemilius, possibly meaning rival or industrious, and arrived in English via the Norman Emilie. Emily topped the American charts every year from 1996 through 2007, a twelve-year reign, and it remains a top-thirty staple. Three syllables with a gentle, unforced rhythm. Bookish without being earnest, classic without being stiff. A name that sounds like a porch light left on.