Inside the Australian and New Zealand book industry

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RiP Al Knight

Hyland House publisher and doyen of the book industry Al Knight has died, aged 88. 

Knight’s wife Janet McCalman writes:
‘Al came to Melbourne in 1971 to be MD of Thomas Nelson. He played a major role in the flowering of Australian publishing that was subsidised by the change of government, the new Australia Council and the Victorian Book Council. In 1977 he left Nelson and with Anne Godden, who had been head of editorial at Nelson, established Hyland House as an independent publisher, with one of their first books being Wendy Lowenstein’s oral history of the Great Depression, Weevils in the Flour. Hyland House published fiction, poetry, children’s and teenage books (including a number of Australian Children’s Book Award winners), history, gardening and other practical books, and in particular, Aboriginal writing.

‘Hyland House was sold to Michael Schoo in 2000 and continues as an imprint with some of its titles still in print. Al was a complete book man, having literally started in the warehouse at Macmillan in London, and after service in the Royal Navy in the war, began working in bookshops in London including Foyles, then as a sales rep around London and south-east England, before emigrating to Canada around 1958. He moved back and forth between England and Canada, working for various publishers and book chains, rising to senior managing positions, before becoming the manager of General Publishing in Toronto. He quickly made his mark as an outstanding publisher and business executive in the trade and was head hunted for jobs in New York and three in Australia. He fell in love with Melbourne and accepted the offer from Thomas Nelson.’

 

Category: Local news