Publishers

Publishers are the individuals traditionally engaged in the business of publishing of books, periodicals, and engravings, while in the modern sense the term also refers to the ones who publish computer software. They are usually the owners or the business head of a newspaper organization or publishing house. Publishers work to release books, novels, magazines, newspapers, textbooks and other printed works to the public. Publishing has a long history—Babylonian clay tablet, the Egyptian papyrus roll, and the medieval vellum codex have all served as publishing media at some points in history. The Sumerians, the Egyptians, and the Chinese were also known to produce books on an extensive scale. In more recent history, William Collins, a 19th century Scottish publisher produced the first Collins English Dictionary and founded William Collins, Sons, now part of HarperCollins. American publisher Bennett Alfred Cerf co-founded the publishing firm Random house along with Donald Simon Klopfer. Also counted amongst the best known publishers of the 20th century, Richard Simon and Max Schuster were the ones to publish the first book of crossword puzzles. Browse on to learn more about the life and works of famous publishers from all over the world.