The publishing firm Kegan Paul, Trench and Company was formed in 1881 when Alfred Trench joined C. Kegan Paul and Company as a partner. The company published a wide range of books, including scientific and literary titles, and a number of distinguished journals, notably the literary journal Nineteeenth Century (1877-1900).
In a scheme devised by Horatio Bottomley, who had amalgamated printers and publishers into the ill-fated Hansard Union, the firm was amalgamated in 1889 with Trubner and George Redway to form Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner and Company Limited, the directors of each of the former companies becoming board members and shareholders. The publishing focuses of the old firms of Kegan Paul and Trubner were soon dissipated in the large new company, which struggled financially. Charles Kegan Paul ceased to be a director in 1895, and though the company continued to publish under new directors, its reputation dwindled.
In 1912 the firm was taken over by George Routledge and Sons, where it was run as a separate company until 1947, when the two companies merged to form Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Kegan Paul was revived as an imprint in the 1980s when Associated Book Publishers purchased Routledge and Kegan Paul and sold the Routledge imprint but continued the Kegan Paul imprint for books for the Middle Eastern market.
