Has anyone read a book published by Penguin?

Penguin Random House is one of the Big Four--the four largest English-language publishing houses in the world.

Anyone who reads a variety of books will at some point read something published by Penguin.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Four_(book_publi...

Books Published By Penguin

Yes, also many in the Pelican imprint, and I've probably sold more than you've had hot dinners lol.

Allen Lane (plus his two brothers John and Richard) started the Publisher in 1935, Allen had the idea of publishing 'High quality inexpensive paperbacks' until that time. paperbacks were just cheap 'lurid pulp fiction'

In the 1930s pulp paper was the cheapest paper, one step up from blotting paper and had high acidity so went brown quickly, hence the term 'Pulp fiction' for cheap throwaway fiction.

Lane approached 'The Bodley Head' press with a view to distribution in UK.

They were doubtful of the proposition, because Allen Lane had put a price of 6d (about 3 cents).

Penguin was able to secure a few 'Decent' fiction titles at a cheap price, mainly because all the other Publishers at the time thought the venture would fail within months.

Lane also published some classics, not least Homer's the Odyssey.

An approach by Woolworth's for 60,000 books secured the future.

Also Allen Lane insisted on a regular format, and based it on the Golden Ratio, indeed if you hold one of the 'A' size Penguin's at the correct distance it is identical to A4 A5 paper, the old Audio Cassette tapes, and the front of the Parthenon at Athen's all use the golden Ratio?

Penguin has since merged with America's Random House and is now one of the largest Publisher's in the world.

It has also been responsible for publishing some of the most important titles in the last 80 years.

Incidentally the 60k order was for the first ten titles, which made 6,000 per title, and that was just Woolworth's chain of shops, W.H.Smith's the other large chain of Book shops at the time in UK purchased on a shop by shop basis, so the 1st titles were likely to have orders for 10,000 per title, this immediately put them into the higher selling bracket.

Most books at the time would be printed in just 2 or 3 thousand for an initial print run to see if they sold?

Efficiencies of scale immediately kicked in hence why Penguin were so successful.

Allen Lane was later Knighted, for British Exports and services to Publishing.

I think most people have read books published by Penguin

Yes, I have read many, many books published by Penguin.

Anyone who has read any books at all will have read a Penguin at some time. Why?

No, I'm prejudiced against penguins and will not read a book with the image of one of those beasts on the cover.

Yes

Yep

I read many as they were the only books in english available in my country and I tried to learn English. They had tests and vocab list at the back...