Hutchinson was a British publishing firm which operated from 1887 until 1985, when it underwent several mergers. It is currently an imprint which is ultimately owned by
Bertelsmann
Bertelsmann SE & Co. KGaA () is a German private multinational conglomerate corporation based in Gütersloh, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is one of the world's largest media conglomerates, and is also active in the service sector and ...
, the German publishing conglomerate.
History
Hutchinson began as Hutchinson & Co. (Publishers) Ltd., an English book publisher, founded in London in 1887 by Sir George Hutchinson and later run by his son, Walter Hutchinson (1887–1950). Hutchinson's published books and magazines such as '' The Lady's Realm'', ''Adventure-story Magazine'', ''Hutchinson's Magazine'' and ''Woman''.Ashley, M. (2006). ''The Age of Storytellers. British Popular Fiction Magazines 1880–1950''. London: The British Library and Oak Knoll Press.
In the 1920s, Walter Hutchinson published many of the "spook stories" of
E. F. Benson
Edward Frederic Benson (24 July 1867 – 29 February 1940) was an English novelist, biographer, memoirist, archaeologist and short story writer.
Early life
E.F. Benson was born at Wellington College (Berkshire), Wellington College in Berkshir ...
in ''Hutchinson's Magazine'' and then in collections in a number of books. The company also first published
Arthur Conan Doyle
Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle (22 May 1859 – 7 July 1930) was a British writer and physician. He created the character Sherlock Holmes in 1887 for ''A Study in Scarlet'', the first of four novels and fifty-six short stories about Ho ...
's
Professor Challenger
George Edward Challenger is a fictional character in a series of fantasy and science fiction stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Unlike Conan Doyle's self-controlled, analytical character, Sherlock Holmes, Professor Challenger is an aggressive, ...
novels, five novels by mystery writer
Harry Stephen Keeler
Harry Stephen Keeler (November 3, 1890 – January 22, 1967) was a prolific but little-known American fiction writer, who developed a cult following for his eccentric mysteries. He also wrote science fiction.
Biography
Born in Chicago in 1 ...
, and short stories by
Eden Phillpotts
Eden Phillpotts (4 November 1862 – 29 December 1960) was an English author, poet and dramatist. He was born in Mount Abu, India, was educated in Plymouth, Devon, and worked as an insurance officer for ten years before studying for the stage a ...
. In 1929, Walter Hutchinson stopped publishing magazines to concentrate on books. In the 1930s, Hutchinson published
The Bulpington of Blup
''The Bulpington of Blup'' is a 1932 novel by H. G. Wells. It is a character study analyzing the psychological sources of resistance to Wellsian ideology, and was influenced by Wells's acquaintance with Carl Gustav Jung and his ideas.
The inner ...
'' as well as the first English translations of
Vladimir Nabokov
Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov (russian: link=no, Владимир Владимирович Набоков ; 2 July 1977), also known by the pen name Vladimir Sirin (), was a Russian-American novelist, poet, translator, and entomologist. Bo ...
's ''
Camera Obscura
A camera obscura (; ) is a darkened room with a aperture, small hole or lens at one side through which an image is 3D projection, projected onto a wall or table opposite the hole.
''Camera obscura'' can also refer to analogous constructions su ...
'' (translated by Winifred Roy with Nabokov credited as Vladimir Nabokoff-Sirin) in 1936 and '' Despair'' (translated by Nabokov himself) under its John Long marque of paperbacks.
In 1947, the company launched the Hutchinson University Library book series.Hutchinson University Library – Book Series List publishinghistory.com. Retrieved 22 October 2017.
Among notable, non-fiction books, in 1959, Hutchinson & Co. published the first English edition of
Karl Popper
Sir Karl Raimund Popper (28 July 1902 – 17 September 1994) was an Austrian-British philosopher, academic and social commentator. One of the 20th century's most influential philosophers of science, Popper is known for his rejection of the cl ...
's most famous work, ''
The Logic of Scientific Discovery
''The Logic of Scientific Discovery'' is a 1959 book about the philosophy of science by the philosopher Karl Popper. Popper rewrote his book in English from the 1934 (imprint '1935') German original, titled ''Logik der Forschung. Zur Erkenntnisthe ...
'', first published as ''
Logik der Forschung
''The Logic of Scientific Discovery'' is a 1959 book about the philosophy of science by the philosopher Karl Popper. Popper rewrote his book in English from the 1934 (imprint '1935') German original, titled ''Logik der Forschung. Zur Erkenntnisth ...
'' in 1934.
The company merged with Century Publishing in 1985 to form Century Hutchinson. The new company acquired Blond, Muller and White in 1987. Century Hutchinson was folded into the British Random House Group in 1989, briefly known as Random Century (1990 - 92), Century became an
imprint
Imprint or imprinting may refer to:
Entertainment
* ''Imprint'' (TV series), Canadian television series
* "Imprint" (''Masters of Horror''), episode of TV show ''Masters of Horror''
* ''Imprint'' (film), a 2007 independent drama/thriller film
...
of Cornerstone Publishing, a publishing house of Penguin Random House UK, which is in turn a division of
Penguin Random House
Penguin Random House LLC is an Anglo-American multinational corporation, multinational conglomerate (company), conglomerate publishing company formed on July 1, 2013, from the merger of Penguin Group and Random House.
On April 2, 2020, Bertels ...
, which itself, since 2013, was owned jointly by
Bertelsmann
Bertelsmann SE & Co. KGaA () is a German private multinational conglomerate corporation based in Gütersloh, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is one of the world's largest media conglomerates, and is also active in the service sector and ...
and
Pearson plc
Pearson plc is a British multinational corporation, multinational publishing and education company headquartered in London, England.
It was founded as a construction business in the 1840s but switched to publishing in the 1920s.J. A. Spende ...
and since 2019, just by Bertelsmann.
Book series
* Chestnut Library
* Hutchinson's Booklover's Library
* Hutchinson Pocket Special
* Hutchinson's Pocket Guides
* Hutchinson’s Pocket Library
* Hutchinson’s Pocket Library: Non-Fiction
* Hutchinson's Popular Pocket Library
* Hutchinson Science SeriesHutchinson Science Library - Book Series List publishinghistory.com. Retrieved 14 August 2022.
* Hutchinson University Library
See also
* ''
Hutchinson Encyclopedia
The ''Hutchinson Encyclopedia'' is an English-language general encyclopedia. It is a single volume designed for use in the home, libraries and schools. It attempts to be readable by reducing the use of technical language. A small subset of the Enc ...