Prometheus Books

Prometheus Books is a publishing company founded in August 1969 by the philosopher Paul Kurtz (who was also the founder of the Council for Secular Humanism, Center for Inquiry, and co-founder of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry). The publisher's name was derived from Prometheus, the Titan from Greek mythology who stole fire from Zeus and gave it to man. This act is often used as a metaphor for bringing knowledge or enlightenment.

Prometheus Books publishes a range of books, focusing on topics such as science, freethought, secularism, humanism, and skepticism. It has published in the "atheism" category since its founding in 1969, and is considered the "grandfather" of atheist publishing in America.

Their headquarters is located in Amherst, New York, and they publish worldwide. Jonathan Kurtz was an executive editor of Prometheus. Rowman & Littlefield acquired Prometheus Books in 2019.

The publisher has roughly 1,700 books currently in print, and publishes approximately 95–100 books per year. Since its founding, Prometheus Books has published more than 2,500 books.

Imprints
Prometheus Books obtained the bulk of the books and manuscripts of Humanities Press International in 1998. It has been building and expanding this into a scholarly imprint named Humanity Books. This imprint publishes academic works across a wide spectrum of the humanities and is now distributed by the academic division of Rowman & Littlefield.

In March 2005, Prometheus Books launched the science fiction and fantasy imprint Pyr. In October 2012 it launched the crime fiction imprint Seventh Street Books. In 2018, it sold both imprints.

Lawsuits
Prometheus has been involved in two "major libel lawsuits." In 1992 Uri Geller sued Victor J. Stenger and Prometheus Books for libel over his book Physics and Psychics. The suit was dismissed and Geller was required to pay more than $20,000 in costs to the defendant. Geller also sued Prometheus for publishing The Truth About Uri Geller by James Randi, a book that he said was defamatory.

Notable authors published
Some notable authors and books published by Prometheus include:

Steve Allen


 * Meeting of Minds : The Complete Scripts, With Illustrations, of the Amazingly Successful PBS-TV Series
 * Steve Allen on the Bible, Religion and Morality
 * Dumbth: The Lost Art of Thinking With 101 Ways to Reason Better & Improve Your Mind

Molefi Asante

Isaac Asimov


 * Election Day 2084: A Science Fiction Anthology on the Politics of the Future
 * The Roving Mind
 * The Tyrannosaurus Prescription: And 100 Other Essays
 * Past, Present and Future

Jeremy Bentham

Rob Boston


 * Why the Religious Right Is Wrong About Separation of Church and State
 * Taking Liberties: Why Religious Freedom Doesn't Give You the Right to Tell Other People What to Do

Ludwig Feuerbach

Antony Flew

R. Barri Flowers
 * Masters of True Crime

Martin Gardner
 * The New Age: Notes of a Fringe Watcher

Guy P. Harrison


 * 50 Simple Questions for Every Christian

William R. Harwood


 * Mythology's Last Gods: Yahweh and Jesus

Sidney Hook


 * Sidney Hook on Pragmatism, Democracy, and Freedom: The Essential Essays
 * Sidney Hook: Philosopher of Democracy and Humanism

Julian Huxley

S. T. Joshi

Dr. Jack Kevorkian
 * Prescription: Medicide, the Goodness of Planned Death

John Maynard Keynes

Philip J. Klass

Leon Lederman

John W. Loftus


 * The Outsider Test for Faith: How to Know Which Religion Is True

Joe Nickell


 * The Science of Ghosts: Searching for Spirits of the Dead
 * The Science of Miracles: Investigating the Incredible

Friedrich Nietzsche

Mario Perniola

Robert M. Price


 * Deconstructing Jesus
 * The Da Vinci Fraud: Why the Truth Is Stranger Than Fiction
 * The Empty Tomb: Jesus Beyond The Grave

James Randi

David Ricardo

Michael Ruse

Nathan Salmon

George H. Smith


 * Atheism: The Case Against God

John Steinbeck IV

Victor Stenger


 * God and the Atom

Tom Toles

Ibn Warraq


 * Why I Am Not a Muslim
 * Virgins? What Virgins?: And Other Essays
 * Defending the West: A Critique of Edward Said's Orientalism

Robert Zubrin

Book series

 * Contemporary Issues in Philosophy Series
 * Great Books in Philosophy
 * Great Minds Series
 * Thomas Taylor Series

Partnerships and sale
In 2013 Prometheus Books partnered with Random House in an effort to increase sales and distribution.

In 2019, it was acquired by Rowman & Littlefield, and Random House ceased sales and distribution of its titles as of June 30, 2019. Its building was sold in early 2019 for over $1 Million.