Constable
Constable is a British publisher descended from Archibald Constable's Edinburgh house of 1795; its London firm, revived in 1890, published Shaw and Dracula and is now a Little, Brown imprint.
- Editions tracked
- 65
- First editions
- 21
- Books
- 65
- Years
- 1890 to 2015
About Constable
Constable is a British publishing house whose roots go back to the Edinburgh bookseller Archibald Constable, who set up in business in 1795; the London firm of Constable & Co., revived in 1890, published George Bernard Shaw, Henry James and Bram Stoker's Dracula, and the name now survives as an imprint of Little, Brown.
The original Edinburgh house was styled Archibald Constable & Co. from 1804, when A. G. Hunter joined as partner. It published Walter Scott, bought the copyright of Waverley in 1814 and ran the Edinburgh Review, but collapsed in the financial crash of 1826.
In 1890 the founder's grandson, also Archibald Constable, revived the publishing name and opened a London office. He retired in 1893 and passed the business to his nephew H. Arthur Doubleday, who brought in Otto Kyllmann and William Meredith; Michael Sadleir joined in 1912. Under these directors the firm became one of the leading London literary houses, publishing Shaw, Theodore Dreiser, Damon Runyon, Dorothy L. Sayers and James Bridie. Stoker published The Watter's Mou', The Shoulder of Shasta and Dracula (1897) with Constable.
In 1999 Constable & Co. merged with Robinson Publishing, founded by Nick Robinson in 1983, to form Constable & Robinson. Little, Brown Book Group, part of Hachette, bought the company in 2014, and Constable continues as one of its imprints.
How to spot a Constable first edition
AuthorsGeorge Bernard Shaw (13)Theodore Dreiser (4)Katherine Mansfield (3)Herman Melville (3)Lucy Maud Montgomery (2)John Dos Passos (2)Henry Adams (1)Gordon Allport (1)Edward Ardizzone (1)W. E. B. Du Bois (1)
SeriesU.S.A.
Published by Constable
Frequently asked questions
How do I identify a Constable first edition?
How many Constable books does MyVolumes track?
We track 65 editions published by Constable, 21 of them first editions, across 65 books.
Where these facts come from
- Constable & Robinson, Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org)
- Archibald Constable, Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org)
- Constable and Company Records, University of Pennsylvania Finding Aids (Temple University SCRC) (findingaids.library.upenn.edu)
- Constable and Company Records: A Student Perspective, Temple University History News (sites.temple.edu)
- First Editions of Today and How to Tell Them (3rd edn), H. S. Boutell, Internet Archive, 1949 (archive.org)
Every fact on this page was checked against the sources listed. Checked 17 October 2026.