Penguin Books – We’ve ALL Held One in Our Hands!

Penguin Random House is now the world’s largest trade book publisher, employing more than 10,000 people globally.

Each year, over 15,000 new titles, and 800 million print, audio and eBooks are sold.

Their publishing lists include more than 60 Nobel Prize laureates and hundreds of the world’s most widely read authors.

In 1935, the then Managing Director of book publishers Bodley Head, visited Agatha Christie in Devon, no doubt with a view to publishing some of her work.

Returning to London, he was standing on the platform of Exeter Station, wishing he had something to read on the journey.

The station kiosk had lots of popular magazines, and poor quality paper-backs, the same choice faced every day by the vast majority of readers, very few of whom could have afforded hard-backed books.

As he waited for the train to appear, Allen Lane’s disappointment at the small range of books generally available, soon turned to anger, and then to a firm resolve to remedy the situation.

The product of the company he subsequently founded, Penguin Books, changed the world.

Lane was adamant that, not only should quality paperbacks be available in bookshops, but also in chain stores and tobacconists, and even sold from vending machines: the first such “Penguincubator” was set up outside Henderson’s bookshop in Charing Cross Road.

Lane was also adamant that the books should cost no more than a packet of cigarettes, then around sixpence.

Lane wanted an animal logo for his new publishing venture, and his secretary suggested ‘Penguin’ as a “dignified, but flippant” name for the new company.

Edward Young, a 21-year-old office junior, was immediately dispatched to London Zoo to sketch the bird in every possible pose for the rest of the day.

Young’s initial cover design avoided the illustrated gaudiness of other paperback publishers, adopting three horizontal bands, the upper and lower of which were colour-coded according to which series the title belonged to; this is sometimes referred to as the horizontal grid.

In the central white panel, the author and title were printed in Gill Sans font, and in the upper band was a cartouche (oval shape) distinctive penguin logo.

The penguin has undergone a number of variations over time, and has been made fun of by its own publisher!



The colour schemes included White with:

• Orange = General Fiction
• Green = Crime Fiction
• Cerise = Travel & Adventure
• Dark Blue = Biographies
• Yellow = Miscellaneous
• Red = Drama
• Purple = Essays & Fine Writing
• Grey = World Affairs

Lane actively resisted the introduction of cover images for several years. Some recent publications of literature from that time have duplicated the original look.

Pelican Books and Puffin Books were also introduced by Penguin. More recently, specialist series about arts and history, and the classics, have included cover illustrations.