Parent company | Penguin Young Readers Group (Penguin Random House) |
---|---|
Founded | 2 April 1940 |
Country of origin | United Kingdom |
Headquarters location | London |
Key people | Francesca Dow (managing director) |
Publication types | Books |
No. of employees | 50 |
Official website | www |
Puffin Books is a longstanding children's imprint of the British publishers Penguin Books. Since the 1960s, it has been among the largest publishers of children's books in the UK and much of the English-speaking world. [1] The imprint now belongs to Penguin Random House, a subsidiary of the German media conglomerate Bertelsmann.
Four years after Penguin Books had been founded by Allen Lane, the idea for Puffin Books was hatched in 1939, when Noel Carrington, at the time an editor for Country Life books, met him and proposed a series of children's non-fiction picture books, inspired by the brightly coloured lithographed books mass-produced at the time for Soviet children. [2] [3] Lane saw the potential, and the first of the picture book series were published the following year. The name "Puffin" was a natural companion to the existing "Penguin" and "Pelican" books. Many continued to be reprinted right into the 1970s. A fiction list soon followed, when Puffin secured the paperback rights to Barbara Euphan Todd's 1936 story Worzel Gummidge and brought it out as the first Puffin story book in 1941. [4]
The first Puffin editor, Eleanor Graham, saw the imprint through the 1940s and the struggles with paper rationing, and in the 1950s Puffin made its mark in fantasy with tales such as The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis and Charlotte's Web by E. B. White. Some other notable titles whose paperback rights were acquired by Puffin included The Family from One End Street by Eve Garnett, which Puffin published in 1942, the Professor Branestawm books by Norman Hunter (1946), Ballet Shoes by Noel Streatfeild (1949), Carbonel: The King of the Cats by Barbara Sleigh (1955), and The Silver Sword by Ian Serraillier (1960). Many different genres featured in the list, e.g. The Puffin Song Book (PS 100), 1956.
In 1961, Kaye Webb became Puffin's second editor, as a boom began in children's publishing, and in a decade the Puffin list grew from 51 titles when she took over to 1,213 in print by 1969. Puffin obtained the paperback rights to many of the best writers of the time, including Philippa Pearce, Rosemary Sutcliff, William Mayne, Alan Garner and Antonia Forest, all-time classics including Mary Poppins , Dr Dolittle and The Hobbit , and originals such as Stig of the Dump by Clive King. The books were promoted with flair through the Puffin Club, started by Kaye Webb in 1967 with the promise to Allen Lane that "It will make children into book readers". Though by 1987, it had become uneconomical and evolved into the schools-only Puffin Book Club, at its height the club had 200,000 subscribers and held regular Puffin Exhibitions, and its magazine Puffin Post appeared quarterly for many years, resuming publication in January 2009.
Webb set up the Puffin Club partly to address class inequality in children's literacy. [5] It was important to her that membership was affordable, and Puffin subsidised costs for that reason. [5] She and her team replied to every letter that children sent in, in order to create a sense of community. [5]
Colony Holidays (predecessor to ATE Superweeks) ran Children's Literature Summer Camps for members of the Puffin Book Club. Fifty or so children from all over Britain who loved reading would spend a ten-day holiday together, and popular children's authors such as Joan Aiken, Ian Serraillier and Clive King would spend a few days with them. [6] Webb continued as editor until 1979, and the 1970s saw Puffin further advance its position with successes such as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl and Watership Down by Richard Adams.
The range of Picture Puffins, introduced in the late 1960s for younger children, also developed rapidly. Eric Carle's The Very Hungry Caterpillar and Janet and Allan Ahlberg's Each Peach Pear Plum became and have remained firm children's favourites, [2] as have Eric Hill's Spot the Dog and Jan Pienkowski's Meg and Mog books from the 1980s.
The 1980s saw Puffin taking full advantage of popular culture with film tie-in publishing, forming close links with Disney and other production companies. It was at this time that Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone introduced the concept of adventure gamebooks to Puffin which grew into the Fighting Fantasy phenomenon. [2] Philippa Dickinson, who had worked for Webb on the Puffin Club, was the editor for the first book, The Warlock of Firetop Mountain . [7]
The 1980s also saw the launch of the Puffin Plus line of young adult fiction, a market earlier catered for by the imprint Peacock Books. In 2010, the young adult line was relaunched as Razorbill. [8]
The 1990s continued to see new writers join Puffin and in the 21st century the brand still shows heroes and heroines familiar to children such as Artemis Fowl, Percy Jackson, Max Gordon, Mildred Hubble and Scarlett, while celebrities such as Kylie Minogue and Madonna have written for Puffin. [2]
In 2023, it was revealed that Puffin had employed sensitivity readers to edit content regarded as objectionable from at least 10 of the classic works of Roald Dahl, making hundreds of changes to Dahl's works to remove words like "fat", "ugly", and "crazy", and references to gender. [9] [10] Phrases such as "boys and girls" became "people" or "children". Puffin explained that these changes were part of the usual editing processes "to ensure that it can continue to be enjoyed by all today." After the revelation of these changes, Puffin was criticised by numerous literary and political figures, including by author Salman Rushdie [11] and Queen Camilla. [12]
Following backlash Puffin announced that they would continue to release the Classic version of Dahl's original works alongside the edited versions, [13] while other publishers of Dahl's works refused to consider the changes at all. [14]
Puffin Post was a children's books magazine published by Puffin Books, and the magazine of the Puffin Club. [15] It was launched in 1967 by Kaye Webb, editor of Puffin Books. [15] It declined after Webb retired in 1982, but was relaunched in 2009 through the bookseller The Book People as a bi-monthly magazine. [15] The magazine was discontinued again with the November 2012 issue. [15]
The magazine contained a mix of stories, jokes, interviews, competitions and quizzes, and reader contributions. [15] At its height, it had more than 200,000 readers. [15] Prior to 1982, contributors to the magazine included well-known authors such as Alan Garner, Roald Dahl, Joan Aiken, Leon Garfield and Spike Milligan. [15] After the 2009 re-launch, contributors included Charlie Higson, Cathy Cassidy and Michael Morpurgo. [15]
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a 1964 children's novel by British author Roald Dahl. The story features the adventures of young Charlie Bucket inside the chocolate factory of eccentric chocolatier Willy Wonka.
The BFG is a 1982 children's novel by British author Roald Dahl. It is an expansion of a short story from Dahl's 1975 novel Danny, the Champion of the World. The book is dedicated to Dahl's late daughter, Olivia, who died of measles encephalitis at the age of seven in 1962.
Matilda is a 1988 children's novel by British author Roald Dahl. It was published by Jonathan Cape. The story features Matilda Wormwood, a precocious child with an uncaring mother and father, and her time in school run by the tyrannical headmistress Miss Trunchbull.
Penguin Books Limited is a British publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers The Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the following year. Penguin revolutionised publishing in the 1930s through its inexpensive paperbacks, sold through Woolworths and other stores for sixpence, bringing high-quality fiction and non-fiction to the mass market. Its success showed that large audiences existed for serious books. It also affected modern British popular culture significantly through its books concerning politics, the arts, and science.
The Witches is a 1983 children's novel by British author Roald Dahl. A dark fantasy, the story is set partly in Norway and partly in England, and features the experiences of a young English boy and his Norwegian grandmother in a world where child-hating societies of witches secretly exist in every country. The witches are ruled by the vicious and powerful Grand High Witch, who arrives in England to organise her plan to turn all of the children there into mice.
James and the Giant Peach is a popular children's novel written in 1961 by British author Roald Dahl. The first edition, published by Alfred Knopf, featured illustrations by Nancy Ekholm Burkert. There have been re-illustrated versions of it over the years, done by Michael Simeon, Emma Chichester Clark, Lane Smith and Quentin Blake. It was adapted into a film of the same name in 1996 which was directed by Henry Selick, and a musical in 2010.
Viking Press is an American publishing company owned by Penguin Random House. It was founded in New York City on March 1, 1925, by Harold K. Guinzburg and George S. Oppenheimer and then acquired by the Penguin Group in 1975.
The Twits is a 1980 children's novel by British author Roald Dahl. It was first published by Jonathan Cape. The story features The Twits, a spiteful, idle, unkempt couple who continuously play nasty practical jokes on each other to amuse themselves, and exercise their devious wickedness on their pet monkeys.
George's Marvellous Medicine is a children's novel written by Roald Dahl and illustrated by Quentin Blake. First published by Jonathan Cape in 1981, it features George Kranky, an eight-year-old boy who concocts his own miracle elixir to replace his tyrannical grandmother's regular prescription medicine.
Esio Trot is a 1990 children's novel by British author Roald Dahl. The title is an anadrome of "tortoise". It was the last of Dahl's books to be published in his lifetime; he died just two months later.
E. P. Dutton was an American book publishing company. It was founded as a book retailer in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1852 by Edward Payson Dutton. Since 1986, it has been an imprint of Penguin Group.
The Enormous Crocodile is a British children's story, written by British author Roald Dahl and illustrated by Quentin Blake. A picture book written for younger readers than Dahl's other works, the story tells of a hungry crocodile who aims to eat human children via using various, not-quite-impenetrable disguises.
Fantastic Mr Fox is a children's novel written by British author Roald Dahl. It was published in 1970, by George Allen & Unwin in the UK and Alfred A. Knopf in the U.S., with illustrations by Donald Chaffin. The first Puffin paperback, first issued in 1974, featured illustrations by Jill Bennett. Later editions have featured illustrations by Tony Ross (1988) and Quentin Blake (1996). The story is about Mr Fox and how he outwits his farmer neighbours to steal their food from right under their noses.
Sir Allen Lane was a British publisher who together with his brothers Richard and John Lane founded Penguin Books in 1935, bringing high-quality paperback fiction and non-fiction to the mass market.
Kathleen ("Kaye") Webb, was a British editor and publisher. She has been called an "enormously influential children's editor" and "brilliant as an innovator of highly successful marketing strategies". She was awarded the Eleanor Farjeon Award in 1970.
Philippa Dickinson is a former editor for Puffin Books, and chair of Random House Children's Publishing. During her time at Puffin, she was the editor of The Warlock of Firetop Mountain, and also acted for a time as the desk editor of Warlock magazine.
Penguin Random House LLC is an Anglo-American multinational conglomerate publishing company formed on July 1, 2013, with the merger of Penguin Books and Random House. Penguin Books was originally founded in 1935 and Random House was founded in 1927. It has more than 300 publishing imprints. Along with Simon & Schuster, Hachette, HarperCollins and Macmillan Publishers, Penguin Random House is considered one of the 'Big Five' English language publishers.
Jill Masefield McDonald was a New-Zealand-born children's writer and illustrator, working in the United Kingdom from the mid-1960s. Much of her work was done for Puffin Books, the children's imprint of Penguin, and for its club's magazine Puffin Post.
A sensitivity reader is someone who reads a literary work, looking for perceived offensive content, stereotypes and bias, creating a report for an author or publisher with suggested changes. The use of sensitivity readers has attracted criticism from some authors and members of the public, particularly with respect to edits to re-editions of previously published works of literature.
Puffin Books, the children's imprint of the British publisher Penguin Books, expurgated various works by British author Roald Dahl in 2023, sparking controversy.