Viking Press (formally Viking Penguin, also listed as Viking Books) is an American publishing company owned by

Penguin Random House Penguin Random House Limited is a British-American multinational corporation, multinational conglomerate (company), conglomerate publishing company formed on July 1, 2013, with the merger of Penguin Books and Random House. Penguin Books was or ...

. It was founded in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

on March 1, 1925, by Harold K. Guinzburg and George S. Oppenheimer and then acquired by the

Penguin Group Penguin Group is a British trade book publisher and part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by the German media company, media Conglomerate (company), conglomerate Bertelsmann. The new company was created by a Mergers and acquisitions, mer ...

in 1975.

Imprints

* Viking Kestrel * Viking Adult, who got in legal trouble in 1946 due to John Steinbeck's bold eulogy, and fell out of public favor in 1947 * Viking children's Books * Viking Portable Library * Pamela Dorman Books

Viking Children's

In 1933, Viking Press founded a department called Junior Books to publish children's books. The first book published was '' The Story About Ping'' in 1933 under editor May Massee. Junior Books was later renamed Viking Children's Books. Viking Kestrel was one of its imprints. 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 and Lane Smith (1993), '' The Outsiders'', '' Pippi Longstocking'', and '' The Story of Ferdinand''. Its paperbacks are now published by Puffin Books, which includes the Speak and Firebird imprints. In 2023, Tamar Brazis was named v-p and publisher of Viking Children's Books.

Viking Critical Library

The Viking Critical Library offers academic editions of literary texts. Like W. W. Norton's ''Norton Critical Editions'', all titles print the text alongside a selection of critical essays and contextual documents (including relevant extracts from the author's oeuvre). The series, which only saw sporadic publications in the late 1970s and late 1990s, has been dormant since 1998, with no new titles released since then. However, a number of existing titles remain in print. ;Titles

Notable authors

* Abdullah II, King of Jordan *

Kingsley Amis Sir Kingsley William Amis (16 April 1922 – 22 October 1995) was an English novelist, poet, critic and teacher. He wrote more than 20 novels, six volumes of poetry, a memoir, short stories, radio and television scripts, and works of social crit ...

* Sherwood Anderson * Hannah Arendt * Peter S. Beagle * Antony Beevor * Saul Bellow * Ludwig Bemelmans * Dan Blum * T. C. Boyle * Geraldine Brooks * Daniel James Brown * William S. Burroughs * Lan Cao * Rosanne Cash * Ferreira de Castro * J. M. Coetzee *

Leonard Cohen Leonard Norman Cohen (September 21, 1934November 7, 2016) was a Canadian songwriter, singer, poet, and novelist. Themes commonly explored throughout his work include faith and mortality, isolation and depression, betrayal and redemption, soc ...

Roald Dahl Roald Dahl (13 September 1916 – 23 November 1990) was a British author of popular children's literature and short stories, a poet, screenwriter and a wartime Flying ace, fighter ace. His books have sold more than 300 million copies ...

* Theodore Draper * Lawrence Durrell * Kim Edwards * Daniel Ellsberg * Helen Fielding * Frederick Forsyth * Don Freeman * Tana French * Elizabeth George * Elizabeth Gilbert * Rumer Godden * Will Gompertz * Graham Greene * R. K. Narayan * Robert Greene * Martha Grimes * S. E. Hinton * David Irving * Kristopher Jansma *

James Weldon Johnson James Weldon Johnson (June 17, 1871June 26, 1938) was an American writer and civil rights activist. He was married to civil rights activist Grace Nail Johnson. Johnson was a leader of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ...

James Joyce James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (born James Augusta Joyce; 2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influentia ...

* Jan Karon * Ezra Jack Keats * Garrison Keillor * William Kennedy * Jack Kerouac * Ken Kesey * Sue Monk Kidd *

Stephen King Stephen Edwin King (born September 21, 1947) is an American author. Dubbed the "King of Horror", he is widely known for his horror novels and has also explored other genres, among them Thriller (genre), suspense, crime fiction, crime, scienc ...

* Jamil Jan Kochai * D. H. Lawrence * Tobsha Learner * Rebecca Makkai *

Hilary Mantel Dame Hilary Mary Mantel ( ; born Thompson; 6 July 1952 – 22 September 2022) was a British writer whose work includes historical fiction, personal memoirs and short stories. Her first published novel, ''Every Day Is Mother's Day'', was releas ...

* Peter Matthiessen * Robert McCloskey * Terry McMillan * Arthur Miller * Jojo Moyes * John Julius Norwich *

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...

Michelle Obama Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama ( Robinson; born January 17, 1964) is an American attorney and author who served as the first lady of the United States from 2009 to 2017, being married to Barack Obama, the 44th president of the United Stat ...

* Richard Osman * Octavio Paz * Steven Pinker * Thomas Pynchon * Ruth Sawyer * Jon Scieszka * Kate Seredy * Katherine Binney Shippen * Upton Sinclair * Wallace Stegner * John Steinbeck * Rex Stout * August Strindberg * Simms Taback * Whitney Terrell * Barbara Tuchman * Carl Van Doren * William T. Vollmann * David Foster Wallace * Rosemary Wells * Rebecca West * Patrick White * Vikram Sampath

Notable editors

* Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, consulting editor * Wendy Wolf, vice president and associate editor, 1994-

Awards

* 10 Newbery Medals * 10 Caldecott Medals * 27 Newbery Honors * 33 Caldecott Honors * 1 American Book Award * 2 Coretta Scott King Awards * 3 Batcheldor Honors * 5 Christopher Medals * 2 Margaret A. Edwards Awards for authors S. E. Hinton and Richard Peck

References

External links

Viking Press overview
at Penguin
Viking Press history
at Penguin (page from August 28, 2006 stored by the Internet Archive)
Viking Children's Books overview
at Penguin

at Penguin (page from April 26, 2008 stored by the Internet Archive) {{Authority control Book publishing companies based in New York (state) Publishing companies based in New York City Publishing companies established in 1925 1925 establishments in New York City 1975 mergers and acquisitions Random House