Four Walls Eight Windows

Four Walls Eight Windows was an independent book publisher in New York City. Its debut occurred in the fall of 1987, under the direction of two young editors, John G. H. Oakes and Daniel Simon (Simon had previously had an imprint under the same name at Writers and Readers Publishing.) In 1995, Oakes and Simon parted ways. Oakes remained as publisher and Simon went on to found Seven Stories Press. In 2004, Four Walls Eight Windows was acquired by the Avalon Publishing Group. Its entire list was incorporated into the Thunder's Mouth Press imprint of Avalon, of which Oakes became publisher. Thunder's Mouth Press itself was acquired in 2007 by the Perseus Books Group. Oakes then became executive editor at Atlas & Company under James Atlas; he is now co-publisher of OR Books. Perseus stopped publishing books under the Thunder's Mouth imprint in May 2007.

Known as 4W8W or "Four Walls", the company was notable for its dual commitment to progressive politics and adventurous, edgy literary fiction. Among its more significant contemporary authors were Steve Aylett, Michael Brodsky, Octavia Butler, Jerome Charyn, Andrei Codrescu, Richard Condon, Sue Coe, R. Crumb, Paul Di Filippo, Cory Doctorow, Annie Ernaux, Andrea Dworkin, Allen Ginsberg, Abbie Hoffman, Margo Howard-Howard, Gordon Lish, Harvey Pekar, Rudy Rucker, Lucius Shepard, Sasha Sokolov and Edward D. Wood, Jr. It also had a line of "modern classics," which included authors such as Nelson Algren, Sherwood Anderson, George Plimpton and Sloan Wilson.