Tag: Expanding literature

1992: HarperCollins begins publishing operations in India…

HarperCollins begins publishing operations in India, represented by Rupa & Co, a small independent publisher. In 2003, HarperCollins India enters a joint venture agreement with the Living Media group, the largest media conglomerate in India. More

2008: HarperCollins India publishes The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga…

HarperCollins India publishes The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga, which wins the 2008 Man Booker Prize. More

Letter to Eleanor Roosevelt regarding a new autobiographical book

Harper editor and chairman of the board Cass Canfield sent this letter, dated April 10, 1951, to Eleanor Roosevelt... More

Letter from John Donovan submitting the manuscript for I’ll Get There. It Better Be Worth the Trip.

In June 1968, author John Donovan wrote to Ursula Nordstrom, head of the U.S. Harper Children’s division, asking her to read the manuscript... 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

Bernie and Pat Zondervan outside their Grand Rapids headquarters

The publishing house of Zondervan was launched during the Great Depression (1931) by brothers Pat and Bernie Zondervan in the spare bedroom of a Michigan farmhouse. 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

1937: Zora Neale Hurston’s masterpiece, Their Eyes Were Watching God is published…

J. B. Lippincott publishes Zora Neale Hurston’s masterpiece, Their Eyes Were Watching God. More

The Zondervans on their silver anniversary

Bernie and Pat Zondervan, founders of the religious publishing firm Zondervan, review some of their early publications on the silver anniversary of their company in 1956. More

Candy package with Timothy Findley’s plans for his novella You Went Away

Canadian author Timothy Findley’s only novella, You Went Away (1996), was based on his parents’ marriage. More

1949: Harlequin Books is founded…

Harlequin Books is founded in Winnipeg by Richard Bonnycastle, Doug Weld, and Jack Palmer. More

1975: Thomas Nelson commissions the New King James Version (NKJV) of the Bible…

Thomas Nelson commissions 130 scholars, pastors, and lay Christians to create the New King James Version (NKJV) of the Bible, aiming to “retain the purity and stylistic beauty” of the original King James produced in 1611. More

Telegram regarding the publication of One Hundred Years of Solitude

In this Western Union telegram dated September 14, 1967, from Cass Canfield Jr. (an editor at Harper) to Carmen Balcells (the agent of Gabriel García Márquez)... More

2015: HarperCollins expands into a global publisher…

HarperCollins expands from a primarily English-language publisher to one publishing in 17 languages, with operations in 18 countries around the world. More

Thomas Nelson: Growth

By 1844, Thomas Nelson’s company had grown large enough to open an office in London, under the leadership of Thomas Nelson Jr. and William Nelson. More

1962: Harper & Brothers merges with Row, Peterson & Co. to form Harper & Row…

Harper & Brothers merges with textbook publisher Row, Peterson & Co. to form Harper & Row. More

200 Years of HarperCollins Publishers

HarperCollins Publishers began as J. & J. Harper, a small family printing shop run by brothers James and John Harper in New York City in March 1817. More

The History of HarperCollins Children’s Books in the U.S.

The Department of Books for Boys and Girls at Harper was established in the U.S. in 1926. More

How Harlequin Became Romance

When Richard H.G. Bonnycastle, a former Arctic explorer with the Hudson Bay Company, launched Harlequin Books in Winnipeg in 1948, he had little interest in building a publishing empire around romance novels. More

1971: William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist is published…

William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist becomes the first horror story to reach number one on the New York Times bestseller list and helps initiate the modern horror film movement. More

Amistad

HarperCollins’s Amistad Press is the oldest imprint devoted to titles for the African American market at any major New York publishing house. More

The Steam-Powered Press

For years, the Harper brothers relied on a white draft horse named Dobbin, who plodded a circular path in the basement of their offices, turning a wooden shaft that powered the Treadwell hand press two floors above, until new technology sent him out to pasture. 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

1972: Avon launches the historical romance genre…

Avon launches the historical romance genre when it publishes Kathleen Woodiwiss’s The Flame and the Flower, a historical romance with a strong female lead and sexual situations that go a step beyond the tame romances of earlier eras. More

Social Change: African American Identity in the U.S.

HarperCollins has published a number of books that explore the racial identity of African Americans during periods of great social conflict. More

1923: The Harper Prize Novel is introduced as a competition to discover unknown authors…

The Harper Prize Novel is introduced as a competition to discover unknown authors, and receives more than 700 submissions in its first year. The first winner, The Able McLaughlins by Margaret Wilson, is later awarded the Pulitzer Prize for the Novel (1924). More

Handwritten letter from John Gray regarding his manuscript for Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus

John Gray sent 330 pages of his manuscript for Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus to his editor Susan Moldow on September 25, 1991, accompanied by this handwritten note. More