Calder Publishing

John Calder started the publishing house in 1949 when manuscripts were plentiful and many books that were in demand were out of print – in the immediate post-war years paper was scarce and severely rationed.

During the 1950s, Calder published a list of translated classics, which included the works of Chekhov, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Goethe and Zola among others. In 1957, Calder published The Walk and Other Stories, the first translation of the Swiss author Robert Walser, translated by Christopher Middleton. The 1957 book is considered a key event in recognition of Walser as an modernist figure not only in English-language awareness but also in Swiss and German-language scholarship as Walser had been largely forgotten in the World War II era.

Calder then began to publish American titles. As a result of Senator Joe McCarthy's "witch-hunt" he was able to acquire significant American authors as well as books on issues of civil liberty that mainstream publishers in New York City were afraid to keep on their lists. This led to the development of close ties with those smaller American firms who resisted the McCarthyite pressure.

By the late 1950s, Calder published a group of new writers argued to have changed the face of twentieth-century literature. One of these was Samuel Beckett, all of whose novels, poetry, criticism, and some of his plays were published by Calder. Several writers on the Calder list became synonymous with the school of the "nouveau roman" or "new novel", including Alain Robbe-Grillet, Marguerite Duras, Claude Simon, Nathalie Sarraute and Robert Pinget. Other European novelists, playwrights and poets included Heinrich Böll, Dino Buzzati, Eugène Ionesco, Fernando Arrabal, René de Obaldia, Peter Weiss and Ivo Andrić. Calder was soon launching new experimental British writers such as Ann Quin, Alan Burns, Eva Tucker and R. C. Kennedy – who, influenced by their European counterparts, became part of the avant-garde of the early 1960s.

Controversy

Following their visit to Scotland, Calder began to publish the previously banned work of writers Henry Miller and William S. Burroughs. Controversy also surrounded the publication of Alexander Trocchi's Cain's Book, which was a success despite a minor obscenity trial in Sheffield. Hubert Selby's Last Exit to Brooklyn, although well reviewed, had a more serious case brought against it, first in a private prosecution by Tory MP Cyril Black, and then at the Old Bailey. John Mortimer led a successful appeal and the company was vindicated after losing in both lower courts.