Sunday, June 03, 2012

Out of Black Ink

What do Mark Twain, J.R.R. Tolkien, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Jonathan Safran Foer all have in common with eight Nobel Prize winners, 47 Pulitzer Prize winners, 13 National Book Award winners, and more than 100 Caldecott, Newbery, Printz, and Sibert Medal and Honor recipients? They are all authors who have had books published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Co. However, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Co. has filed for bankruptcy, so another American legend may come to an end. It makes me wonder who is keeping tabs of the dissolving aspects of our culture. This publisher has been around since 1832. Imagine how many authors they published in 180 years of being in business?  

An article from Bloomberg.com states '“The global financial crisis over the past several years has negatively affected' Houghton Mifflin’s financial performance, in a business that “depends largely on state and local funding' for the schoolbook market, said William Bayers, company general counsel, in court papers."

When I taught elementary school, all of our textbooks were published by Houghton Mifflin. Curious George is wondering what this world is coming to and I am just a curious, but also apprehensive.
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