Everyman's Library was founded in 1906 by Joseph Dent who promised beautiful editions of the classics at a shilling a volume ‘to appeal to every kind of reader: the worker, the student, the child, the man and the woman’ and rapidly became the greatest library of the classics in the English language before being eclipsed by paperbacks in the 1960s.

In 1991 it was reborn as what John Updike called "the permanent library of reference" in a new highly readable format with new typography, substantial literary chronologies and introductions, printed on fine, acid free paper and sewn cloth bindings and sold at prices close to those of paperback editions. It now has more than 500 titles in print in four series including one of the largest lists of modern classic authors.