Other classic Pelican books included Totem and Taboo, The Eighteen Nineties, An Introduction to Modern Architecture, Coming of Age in Samoa, Pelican History of England, The Pelican Guide to English Literature, and Childhood in Society. Pelican published many of the major intellects of the 20th century including historian Eric Hobsbawm, literary critic Boris Ford, philosopher A.J. Élie Halévy, A History of the English People in 1815, vol. 1. Julian Huxley, Essays in Popular Science īonamy Dobrée and G. E. Wells, A Short History of the World (previously published as a Penguin)

Olaf Stapledon, Last and First Men (the only work of fiction published under Pelican) 'A1' and 'A2' were the two volumes of George Bernard Shaw’s newly augmented The Intelligent Woman's Guide to Socialism, Capitalism, Sovietism and Fascism however, these were just two of nine volumes published in May 1937, the others being įor their first few decades, each regular Pelican was given a number starting 'A'. In 1938, The Spectator reported, 'If there is any sense in saying that the culture of the world should be accessible to all without distinctions of wealth, such publications are helping to make it true.' These books became especially popular among the self-educating post-war generation, and Pelican was even called an ‘informal university for '50s Britons’ by The Guardian. Founder Allen Lane wrote, ‘We… believed in the existence in this country of a vast reading public for intelligent books at a low price, and staked everything on it.’ Pelican lowered the traditional barriers to knowledge by selling books at the cost of a packet of cigarettes. Pelican Books was established in 1937 as a non-fiction imprint for low-cost intellectual paperbacks. Among the latter, the copy of George Henderson's Gothic is, unusually, a hardback, as first bound.

Note the two common formats: the smaller original format, and the later larger format.

1984 penguin books