The Fellowship of the Ring
First volume in The Lord of the Rings series, which has sold more than 100 million copies. More
1958: Collins publishes the first English translation of Doctor Zhivago…
Collins publishes the first English translation of Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature. More
I Can Read!
Inspired by an occasion in which she attempted to find an appropriate book for a young boy who had just learned to read, Boston librarian Virginia Haviland telephoned her friend Ursula Nordstrom, the head of children’s publishing at Harper & Brothers. More
To Kill a Mockingbird
Much-loved Pulitzer Prize–winning classic, voted by librarians across America as the best novel of the twentieth century. More
And Then There Were None
The bestselling crime novel of all time. More
Ben-Hur
Lew Wallace, a Union general in the Civil War, wrote the biblical novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ in 1880. More
1848: Harper & Brothers publishes the first American editions of the Brontë’s works
Harper & Brothers publishes the first American editions of Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, and Anne Brontë's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. More
Social Change: Women Writers
In the mid-late 1800s, Harper & Brothers reprinted several milestone titles in the history of British feminist literature as well as the global canon, such as Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights (1847), Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre (1847), and Anne Brontë’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848), as well as George Eliot’s Middlemarch (1872). More
1924: “Queen of Crime” Agatha Christie joins the house of Collins…
“Queen of Crime” Agatha Christie joins the house of Collins, and two years later publishes her seminal Hercule Poirot novel, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. More
Pushing the Boundaries of Children’s Literature
Children’s books explored uncharted territory in the mid-1960s as Harper & Row began to champion boundary-pushing children’s and young adult books. More
To Kill a Mockingbird
When J. B. Lippincott (later acquired by HarperCollins) editor Therese (Tay) von Hohoff saw the first draft of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird (1960), she saw a promising story, but one in need of some reshaping and editing. More
Gabriel García Márquez
Gabriel García Márquez drew on his childhood experiences in Colombia when crafting the story of the fictional Buendía family in the classic One Hundred Years of Solitude. More
The Cat in the Hat
This iconic Dr. Seuss book is one of the bestselling children’s books of all time. More
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
An American classic called “one of the books of the century” by the New York Public Library. More
Harold and the Purple Crayon
Classic children’s story about imagination that has never been out of print. More
Moby-Dick
Often called the greatest American novel of all time. More
Fahrenheit 451
Though set in a dystopian world without books, Bradbury’s most famous work has never gone out of print. More
Danny and the Dinosaur
I Can Read! classic that was named a 1958 New York Times Outstanding Book of the Year. More
Michael Bond
I was brought up in a house where books were an essential part of the furnishings. More
The Woman in White
One of the earliest works of detective fiction, this story caused a sensation with readers at the time. More
Tess of the d’Urbervilles
Major nineteenth-century English novel that challenged the sexual morals of late Victorian England. More
Bleak House
Dickens’s tenth novel, often considered his finest; significantly influenced the development of mystery novels. More
The Carrot Seed
An early classic in children’s literature about perseverance; never out of print. More
The War of the Worlds
The much-adapted classic from “the father of science fiction.” More
1953: William Collins and Sons gains the rights to publish C. S. Lewis…
William Collins and Sons purchases the religious publishing firm of Geoffrey Bles, Ltd., gaining the rights to the works of C. S. Lewis, including his Chronicles of Narnia fantasy books. More
1903: Collins is the first to publish illustrated shilling-priced paperbacks…
Collins is the first to publish a series of illustrated, shilling-priced pocket size classics with the introduction of Collins Illustrated Pocket Classics. Included in this series are a maroon cloth-bound David Copperfield, many other Charles Dickens favorites, Sir Walter Scott’s Kenilworth, George Eliot’s Adam Bede, and Charlotte Brontë’s Shirley. More
Our Town
Pulitzer Prize–winning drama; hailed by Edward Albee as “The finest play ever written by an American.” More