Viking Press
Encyclopedia
Viking Press is an American publishing company owned by the Penguin Group
, which has owned the company since 1975. It was founded in New York City
on March 1, 1925, by Harold K. Guinzburg and George S. Oppenheim. The firm's name and logo—a Viking ship
drawn by Rockwell Kent
—were meant to evoke the ideas of exploration and enterprise implied by the word "Viking
".
The house has been home to many prominent authors of fiction, non-fiction, and play scripts. Five Viking authors have been awarded Nobel Prizes for Literature and one received the Nobel Peace Prize
; Viking books have also won numerous Pulitzer Prizes, National Book Award
s, and other important literary prizes.
Viking published approximately 100 books a year. It is notable for publishing both successful commercial fiction and acclaimed literary fiction and non-fiction. Viking's literary paperbacks are published by Penguin Books, while its commercial paperbacks are published by Signet Books or Putnam Books. Viking's current president is Clare Ferraro.
The Viking Children's Book department was established in 1933; its founding editor was May Massee
. Viking Kestrel was one of its imprint
s. Its books have won the Newbery
and Caldecott
Medals, and include such books as The Twenty-One Balloons
, written and illustrated by William Pene du Bois
, (1947, Newbery medal winner for 1948), Corduroy
, Make Way for Ducklings
, The Stinky Cheese Man
By Jon Scieszka
& Lane Smith
1993, The Outsiders
, Pippi Longstocking
, and The Story of Ferdinand
. Its paperbacks are published by Puffin Books
, which includes the Speak
and Firebird
imprints. Viking Children's current president and publisher is Regina Hayes.
Penguin Group
The Penguin Group is a trade book publisher, the largest in the world , having overtaken Random House in 2009. The Penguin Group is the name of the incorporated division of parent Pearson PLC that oversees these publishing operations...
, which has owned the company since 1975. It was founded in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
on March 1, 1925, by Harold K. Guinzburg and George S. Oppenheim. The firm's name and logo—a Viking ship
Viking ship
Viking ships were vessels used during the Viking Age in Northern Europe. Scandinavian tradition of shipbuilding during the Viking Age was characterized by slender and flexible boats, with symmetrical ends with true keel. They were clinker built, which is the overlapping of planks riveted together...
drawn by Rockwell Kent
Rockwell Kent
Rockwell Kent was an American painter, printmaker, illustrator, and writer.- Biography :Rockwell Kent was born in Tarrytown, New York, the same year as fellow American artists George Bellows and Edward Hopper...
—were meant to evoke the ideas of exploration and enterprise implied by the word "Viking
Viking
The term Viking is customarily used to refer to the Norse explorers, warriors, merchants, and pirates who raided, traded, explored and settled in wide areas of Europe, Asia and the North Atlantic islands from the late 8th to the mid-11th century.These Norsemen used their famed longships to...
".
The house has been home to many prominent authors of fiction, non-fiction, and play scripts. Five Viking authors have been awarded Nobel Prizes for Literature and one received the Nobel Peace Prize
Nobel Peace Prize
The Nobel Peace Prize is one of the five Nobel Prizes bequeathed by the Swedish industrialist and inventor Alfred Nobel.-Background:According to Nobel's will, the Peace Prize shall be awarded to the person who...
; Viking books have also won numerous Pulitzer Prizes, National Book Award
National Book Award
The National Book Awards are a set of American literary awards. Started in 1950, the Awards are presented annually to American authors for literature published in the current year. In 1989 the National Book Foundation, a nonprofit organization which now oversees and manages the National Book...
s, and other important literary prizes.
Viking published approximately 100 books a year. It is notable for publishing both successful commercial fiction and acclaimed literary fiction and non-fiction. Viking's literary paperbacks are published by Penguin Books, while its commercial paperbacks are published by Signet Books or Putnam Books. Viking's current president is Clare Ferraro.
The Viking Children's Book department was established in 1933; its founding editor was May Massee
May Massee
May Massee was a children's book editor. Massee became the head of Doubleday's first juvenile department in 1922. Upon leaving Doubleday, she started Viking Press's first juvenile department in 1932...
. Viking Kestrel was one of its imprint
Imprint
In the publishing industry, an imprint can mean several different things:* As a piece of bibliographic information about a book, it refers to the name and address of the book's publisher and its date of publication as given at the foot or on the verso of its title page.* It can mean a trade name...
s. Its books have won the Newbery
Newbery Medal
The John Newbery Medal is a literary award given by the Association for Library Service to Children, a division of the American Library Association . The award is given to the author of the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children. The award has been given since 1922. ...
and Caldecott
Caldecott Medal
The Caldecott Medal is awarded annually by the Association for Library Service to Children , a division of the American Library Association, to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children published that year. The award was named in honor of nineteenth-century English...
Medals, and include such books as The Twenty-One Balloons
The Twenty-One Balloons
The Twenty-One Balloons is a novel by William Pène du Bois, published in 1947 and awarded the Newbery Medal for excellence in American children's literature in 1948. The story is about a retired schoolteacher whose ill-fated balloon trip leads him to discover an island full of great wealth and...
, written and illustrated by William Pene du Bois
William Pène du Bois
William Pène du Bois , was a French American author and illustrator. He was best known for The Twenty-One Balloons, published in April 1947 by The Viking Press...
, (1947, Newbery medal winner for 1948), Corduroy
Corduroy (book)
Corduroy is a 1968 book written by Don Freeman, and published by Viking Press. It tells the story of a teddy bear named Corduroy, who is bought in a department store by a girl named Lisa. Don Freeman wrote a sequel, A Pocket for Corduroy in 1978....
, Make Way for Ducklings
Make Way For Ducklings
Make Way for Ducklings is a children's picture book written and illustrated by Robert McCloskey. First published in 1941, the book tells the story of a pair of mallard ducks who decide to raise their family on an island in the lagoon in Boston Public Garden, a park in the center of Boston,...
, The Stinky Cheese Man
The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales
The Stinky Cheese Man and Fairly Stupid Tales is a postmodern children's book by Jon Scieszka. Published in 1992 by Viking, it is a collection of twisted, humorous parodies of famous children's stories and fairy tales, such as "Little Red Riding Hood", "The Ugly Duckling" and "The Gingerbread Man"...
By Jon Scieszka
Jon Scieszka
Jon Scieszka was born September 8, 1954 in Flint, Michigan is an American author of children's literature, best known for his collaborations with illustrator Lane Smith. He is also a nationally recognized reading advocate, and in early 2008 was named the National Ambassador for Young People's...
& Lane Smith
Lane Smith (illustrator)
Lane Smith is an American children's book author and illustrator.-Background:Smith was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, but moved to Corona, California at a young age...
1993, The Outsiders
The Outsiders (novel)
The Outsiders is a coming-of-age novel based in 1965 by S. E. Hinton, first published in 1967 by Viking Press. Hinton was 15 when she started writing the novel, but did most of the work when she was sixteen and a junior in high school. Hinton was 18 when the book was published...
, Pippi Longstocking
Pippi Longstocking
Pippi Longstocking is a fictional character in a series of children's books by Swedish author Astrid Lindgren, and adapted into multiple films and television series...
, and The Story of Ferdinand
The Story of Ferdinand
The Story of Ferdinand is the best known work written by American author Munro Leaf and illustrated by Robert Lawson. The children's book tells the story of a bull who would rather smell flowers than fight in bullfights...
. Its paperbacks are published by Puffin Books
Puffin Books
Puffin Books is the children's imprint of British publishers Penguin Books. Since the 1960s it has been the largest publisher of children's books in the UK and much of the English-speaking world.-Early history:...
, which includes the Speak
Speak
-Music:* Speak , the Hungarian rap artist and internet phenomenon famous for his anti-war video* Speak , the debut album by the actress Lindsay Lohan* Speak , a compilation album by No-Man...
and Firebird
Firebird Books
Firebird Books is an imprint of Penguin Group Inc., publishing mainly paperback reprint editions of science fiction and fantasy for teenagers and adults....
imprints. Viking Children's current president and publisher is Regina Hayes.
Notable authors
Viking Press has published books by the following writers and public figures:- Abdullah IIAbdullah II of JordanAbdullah II ibn al-Hussein is the reigning King of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. He ascended the throne on 7 February 1999 after the death of his father King Hussein. King Abdullah, whose mother is Princess Muna al-Hussein, is a member of the Hashemite family...
, King of Jordan - Saul BellowSaul BellowSaul Bellow was a Canadian-born Jewish American writer. For his literary contributions, Bellow was awarded the Pulitzer Prize, the Nobel Prize for Literature, and the National Medal of Arts...
- Ludwig BemelmansLudwig BemelmansLudwig Bemelmans was an Austrian author, an internationally known gourmet, and a writer and illustrator of children's books. He is most noted today for his Madeline books, six of which were published from 1939-1961...
- T. C. Boyle
- William S. BurroughsWilliam S. BurroughsWilliam Seward Burroughs II was an American novelist, poet, essayist and spoken word performer. A primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodernist author, he is considered to be "one of the most politically trenchant, culturally influential, and innovative artists of the 20th...
- Rosanne CashRosanne CashRosanne Cash is an American singer-songwriter and author. She is the eldest daughter of the late country music singer Johnny Cash and his first wife, Vivian Liberto Cash Distin....
- Theodore DraperTheodore DraperTheodore H. "Ted" Draper was an American historian and political writer. Draper is best known for the 14 books which he completed during his life, including work regarded as seminal on the formative period of the American Communist Party, the Cuban Revolution, and the Iran-Contra Affair...
- Kim EdwardsKim EdwardsKim Edwards is an American author and educator. Her first novel, The Memory Keeper's Daughter , is a New York Times Bestseller, and was honored with the Sainsbury's Popular Fiction Award at the 2008 British Book Awards....
- Helen FieldingHelen FieldingHelen Fielding is an English novelist and screenwriter, best known as the creator of the fictional character Bridget Jones, a sequence of novels and films that chronicle the life of a thirtysomething single woman in London as she tries to make sense of life and love.Her novels Bridget Jones's...
- Elizabeth GilbertElizabeth GilbertElizabeth M. Gilbert is an American author, essayist, short story writer, biographer, novelist and memoirist. She is best known for her 2006 memoirs, Eat, Pray, Love, which as of December 2010, has spent 199 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller list, and was also made into a film by the same...
- Rumer GoddenRumer GoddenMargaret Rumer Godden OBE was an English author of over 60 fiction and nonfiction books written under the name of Rumer Godden. A few of her works were co-written by her sister, Jon Godden, who wrote several novels on her own...
- Graham GreeneGraham GreeneHenry Graham Greene, OM, CH was an English author, playwright and literary critic. His works explore the ambivalent moral and political issues of the modern world...
- Martha GrimesMartha GrimesMartha Grimes is an American author of detective fiction.She was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to William Dermit Grimes, Pittsburgh's city solicitor, and to June Dunnington, who owned the Mountain Lake Hotel in Western Maryland where Martha and her brother spent much of their childhood. Grimes...
- Jan KaronJan KaronJan Karon is an American writer and novelist, who has written for both children and adults. Karon was born in Lenoir, North Carolina, in 1937, as Janice Meredith Wilson. She retired from a career in advertising and moved to Blowing Rock, North Carolina, to write...
- Garrison KeillorGarrison KeillorGary Edward "Garrison" Keillor is an American author, storyteller, humorist, and radio personality. He is known as host of the Minnesota Public Radio show A Prairie Home Companion Gary Edward "Garrison" Keillor (born August 7, 1942) is an American author, storyteller, humorist, and radio...
- William KennedyWilliam Kennedy (author)William Joseph Kennedy is an American writer and journalist born and raised in Albany, New York. Many of his novels feature the interaction of members of the fictional Irish-American Phelan family, and make use of incidents of Albany's history and the supernatural...
- Jack KerouacJack KerouacJean-Louis "Jack" Lebris de Kerouac was an American novelist and poet. He is considered a literary iconoclast and, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Kerouac is recognized for his spontaneous method of writing, covering topics such as Catholic...
- Sue Monk KiddSue Monk KiddSue Monk Kidd is a writer from the Southern United States, best known for her novel, The Secret Life of Bees.- Biography :Kidd, who was born in Sylvester, Georgia, graduated from Texas Christian University with a B.S...
- Stephen KingStephen KingStephen Edwin King is an American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy fiction. His books have sold more than 350 million copies and have been adapted into a number of feature films, television movies and comic books...
- Terry McMillanTerry McMillanTerry McMillan is an American author. Her interest in books comes from working at a library when she was sixteen. She received her BA in journalism in 1986 at University of California, Berkeley. Her work is characterized by strong female protagonists.Her first book, Mama, was published in 1987...
- Arthur MillerArthur MillerArthur Asher Miller was an American playwright and essayist. He was a prominent figure in American theatre, writing dramas that include plays such as All My Sons , Death of a Salesman , The Crucible , and A View from the Bridge .Miller was often in the public eye,...
- Thomas PynchonThomas PynchonThomas Ruggles Pynchon, Jr. is an American novelist. For his most praised novel, Gravity's Rainbow, Pynchon received the National Book Award, and is regularly cited as a contender for the Nobel Prize in Literature...
- Kate SeredyKate SeredyKate Seredy was a Hungarian-born writer and illustrator of children's books, written in the English language.-Life:...
- John SteinbeckJohn SteinbeckJohn Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American writer. He is widely known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden and the novella Of Mice and Men...
- Carl Van Doren
- Rebecca WestRebecca WestCicely Isabel Fairfield , known by her pen name Rebecca West, or Dame Rebecca West, DBE was an English author, journalist, literary critic and travel writer. A prolific, protean author who wrote in many genres, West was committed to feminist and liberal principles and was one of the foremost public...
External links
- Viking Press history at PenguinPenguin GroupThe Penguin Group is a trade book publisher, the largest in the world , having overtaken Random House in 2009. The Penguin Group is the name of the incorporated division of parent Pearson PLC that oversees these publishing operations...
- Viking Children's Books history at PenguinPenguin GroupThe Penguin Group is a trade book publisher, the largest in the world , having overtaken Random House in 2009. The Penguin Group is the name of the incorporated division of parent Pearson PLC that oversees these publishing operations...