Penguin Books began life in 1934 when its founder, Allen Lane, was stranded at Exeter station with nothing to read.
At the time, hardbacks were hugely expensive and paperbacks widely dismissed as cheap, trashy “pulp fiction”.
Lane’s idea? To sell great literature at cheap prices.
And so, in 1935, Penguin Books was born.
Its initial catalogue of 10 books, priced at just sixpence each, included a reprint of Agatha Christie’s The Mysterious Affair at Styles.
The logo? A black and white penguin sketched at London Zoo after Lane’s secretary suggested the bird as the company’s name.
Within a year, three million Penguin books had been sold and a publishing revolution was born.