The Modern Library is an American publishing company. Founded in 1917 by Albert Boni and Horace Liveright as an imprint of their publishing company Boni & Liveright, it was purchased in 1925 by Bennett Cerf and Donald Klopfer. Random House began in 1927 as a subsidiary of the Modern Library, but eventually became the parent company.

Recent history

The Modern Library originally published only hardbound books. In 1950, it began publishing the Modern Library College Editions, a forerunner of its current series of paperback classics. From 1955 to 1960, the company published a quality numbered paperback series, but discontinued it in 1960, when the series was merged into the newly acquired Vintage paperbacks group. The Modern Library homepage states:

In 1998, novelist David Ebershoff became the Modern Library's new Publishing Director. Ebershoff managed the imprint until 2005, resigning to concentrate on his own writing and to become editor-at-large at Random House.

In September 2000, the Modern Library initiated a newly designed Paperback Classics series. Six new titles are published in the series on the second Tuesday of each month.