When we think of US modernist presses, a series of images comes to mind: Horace Liveright, who issued T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land alongside bestselling novels and popular theater plays; Alfred Knopf and his wife Blanche, who promoted the new African American literature and original crime fiction by Dashiell Hammett; B. W. Huebsch, who published Sherwood Anderson, James Joyce, and D. H. Lawrence, but also radical political texts. This chapter focuses on the diversity of American modernist presses – from avant-garde imprints to long-established houses, from limited editions to inexpensive reprints. The period between the wars has been mythologized as a “golden age.” This chapter scraps the gold to reveal a more nuanced picture of the publishing landscape. As Bennett Cerf (the owner of the Modern Library) declared, flamboyant but dysfunctional houses had no chance of surviving: publishing was a business, and the fun and excitement of discovering new authors would always compete with the necessity of making a profit.

This chapter explains the value of incorporting materialist analysis into studies of intellectual history and the history of science by examining the curious case of a tiny anonymous herbal that was one of the most popular English books of the sixteenth century. It shows that these works of natural history have been receiving increased attention from scholars and that this scholarship is unfortunately limited by too much attention upon herbals’ authors to the detriment of those figures who commissioned, marketed, made, and sold botanical books to an eager early modern public.

In her 1949 article ‘We Want Books – But Do We Encourage Our Writers?’, Jamaican writer Una Marson alludes to the lack of exposure of Caribbean writers to potential readers and bemoans the lack of interest in reading. She also implies that Caribbean writers might be scarce or unproductive because they lack financial support. As the second decade of the twenty-first century closes, it is clear that the cultivation of a Caribbean reading audience as well as a market for Caribbean literature has gathered momentum since 1949. This essay considers the role of literary prizes and festivals in stimulating new writing, in growing a global audience for Caribbean literature and in supporting the careers of Caribbean writers in the region and in the Caribbean diaspora.

Already at a young age, Strauss made initial contacts with well-known publishing houses. Eugen Spitzweg of the Munich publishing house Jos. Aibl became a paternal friend for the aspiring composer. At the beginning, when Strauss was barely known to a wide audience, Spitzweg expressed his friendship by including Strauss’s compositions in his catalog. But soon Strauss’s reputation grew – and with it his self-confidence in negotiations with his business partners. Unlike some other important composers in music history, Strauss developed into a capable businessman and secured high fees for his music. This chapter highlights the publishing context of Strauss’s work. It characterizes his relationships with his long-time main publishers, names the publishers with whom Strauss collaborated only briefly, and presents an overview of the great variety of sheet music editions (from historical publications to modern critical editions) in which Strauss’s music is available.