AustLit

In addition to publishing the Bulletin, the Bulletin Newspaper Company engaged 'in the sporadic publication of many separate items ranging from important Australian novels to non-fiction books, magazines, ephemera and a series of postcards'.

J. F. Archibald, editor of the Bulletin, initiated book publishing at the Bulletin Newspaper Company in 1888. From 1896 to 1906, it was under the charge of the newspaper's literary editor A. G. Stephens. During Stephens's tenure, more than 35 titles were published, some of which were reprinted from the Bulletin. Early titles included books of verse, such as those by Will Ogilvie, and short stories. Steele Rudd's On Our Selection (1899) became a bestseller. In 1899, too, A. G. Stephens published five numbers of the literary periodical, The Bookfellow. Then, in 1903, he published the book deemed the 'most significant' of those he published at the Bulletin Newspaper Company: Joseph Furphy's Such is Life.

Following Stephens's departure, the Lone Hand was published on Archibald's initiative as a literary monthly from 1907 to 1921. Book publishing thereafter was 'fitful' until 1932 when Norman Lindsay convinced the company to sponsor P. R. Stephensen's Endeavour Press. This book publishing venture failed after two years, and books were again published under the Bulletin imprint. A handful of books, including Dymphyna Cusack's Jungfrau (1936), were published by the Bulletin Newspaper Co. between 1936 and 1952, the last of which was The Letters of Rachel Henning (1952), illustrated by Norman Lindsay.

Source: Jennifer Alison, 'Case-study: The Bulletin as Publisher', A History of the Book in Australia 1891-1945: A National Culture in a Colonised Market, M. Lyons and J. Arnold eds, UQP, St Lucia, 2001, pp. 57-59.