[8] A Ford Foundation scholarship enabled him to earn his BA degree in English literature at Columbia College, going on to read PPE at Christ Church, Oxford University, where he graduated in 1954.
[9] In 1961 Mayer began work as an editorial assistant at Orion Press, followed in 1962 by a 14-year tenure at Avon Books, where he became Editor in Chief and Publisher.
[9] During his time at Penguin, Mayer courted controversy as he agreed to publish Salman Rushdie's 1988 novel, The Satanic Verses.
[8] The book led to a major argument with Ayatollah Khomeini, the Supreme Leader of Iran, issuing a fatwā instructing Muslims to kill the author.
[8] After leaving Penguin, Mayer returned to his own firm, The Overlook Press, which he had been developing in his free time over the past few decades.
[11] The imprint was responsible for the resurrection of the Freddy the Pig series of children's books, returning them to print for the first time since 1958.