Several weeks ago, I was appalled to hear that a publisher had reprinted Wuthering Heights with a cover that was clearly mimicking the Twilight book covers. (And in case we didn’t make the connection, the cover spells it out: “Bella and Edward’s Favorite Book.”) Fine. I’ve never actually enjoyed Wuthering Heights anyway, so let the legion of Twilight fans be sucked in by the marketing schemes of HarperTeen.
Sadly, the trend didn’t stop there. They’ve Twilight-ified Pride and Prejudice.
Bastardos! Now, I’m down with vampire lore, old and new. Buffy, Angel, the original Dracula novel, Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian, Interview with the Vampire, The Lost Boys (Jason Patric, boys eating maggots, Edward “Lorelai Gilmore’s Dad” Hermann, does it get any better than that?) . . . bring it on! I just don’t see why Pride and Prejudice needs to look like Twilight to get girls (or boys) to pick it up and read it. And what, what, does this cover have to do with the style of Jane Austen? It’s soppy, cheesy, and over-simplified. It has no sense of humor. Do we see Lizzie and Darcy throwing flowers at each other in the dark? No, we see them in a duel of wits on the dance floor. A pair of crossed swords would have made a better, albeit still too romantic, cover for our beloved Pride and Prejudice.
Maybe it’s that I produce books for a living, but I have strong feeling on the subject of book covers. My favorite Jane Austen cover designs are from the mid-1990s, published by State Street Press (an imprint of Borders). I like the clean look, the modern type with the old fashioned images. And, because I am a production dork, I love that the images are glossy on a matte background, making them pop.
I also like the new illustrated cover from Penguin Classics. Slightly Edward Gorey-esque style (though true Ruben Toledo fans might not like me referencing another artist), but clean and fun. You can almost see them flirtatiously throwing insults at each other the moment before.
What’s your favorite cover design for a Jane Austen book, and why?
October 22nd, 2009 at 10:11 am
Those covers are awesome (white background ones)! Are those rings on the one on the left?
October 22nd, 2009 at 10:13 am
I wholeheartedly agree! I love Twilight but love Austen more and the new covers are so sneaky..trying to get a new audience. I mean, I get it..but I don’t agree. Austen came BEFORE Twilight people!!
xx Austen Lover
October 22nd, 2009 at 10:16 am
Sandra, yes, those are rings (I just replaced the photo with one that was a little brighter…though it’s not much better–sun’s not out just yet). I wish I had the entire set, but I haven’t been able to find the rest. They’re also fairly small for hardcovers, so easy to carry or pack for vacations!
October 22nd, 2009 at 10:19 am
ecdesign–I get what they’re doing…and if I were in their marketing dept, I’d probably do the same thing! I’m just personally annoyed by it.
I’m also annoyed by chick lit covers. I didn’t particularly like the book Juiie and Julia, but I loved the cover of the book. But for the paperback, they made it a chick lit cover to tap into that audience, even though the original cover was charming and true to the story.
October 22nd, 2009 at 10:50 am
One could argue – that as SUCKY as these covers are- as well as the upsetting continual dumbing down of consumer design expectations… It MAY just lead to a young girl picking up a classic and realizing HOW much better it is than the Twilight series. One can hope. I will.
October 22nd, 2009 at 11:27 am
The P&P one also reminds me of the cover of The Crimson Petal and the White (aka Emily Gilmore’s favorite trashy read…apparently it’s Elder Gilmores Day at Austenacious), another *quality* work of literature. Either way, not a fan, but mostly because I love me some modern graphics. I do still covet your State Street set, though I quite like the new Penguin one as well.
Also, Mrs. Light, I can get on that train. Since it’s out there anyway, I’ll hope for good exposure.
October 22nd, 2009 at 12:39 pm
“The P&P one also reminds me of the cover of The Crimson Petal and the White (aka Emily Gilmore’s favorite trashy read…apparently it’s Elder Gilmores Day at Austenacious)”
See, this is why I should own all of the GG DVDs! I haven’t thought of that tidbit in years. Better yet, has some GG fan out there compiled a video of every Emily and Richard scene? Now *that* would be worth owning.
October 22nd, 2009 at 1:39 pm
I like these ones, though I don’t think they’re published for real : http://nytimesbooks.blogspot.com/2009/05/jane-austen.html
It’s a new twist on the “classic book cover”, and the story gets told very nicely.
I also dig these by Coralie Bickford-Smith http://www.flickr.com/photos/26408069@N05/3040134569/. It’s a whole series, and until now there’s Emma, S&S and P&P – I hope they’ll publish the last three ones. They’re very nice made.
October 22nd, 2009 at 3:31 pm
I love those State Street covers unreservedly. All my editions (yes, all of them, because they are multiple) have: a grand house, a picture of a woman, or an unaffiliated piece of art on the cover.
I just don’t see why Pride and Prejudice needs to look like Twilight to get girls (or boys) to pick it up and read it.
I’m also offended by the notion that Miss Austen needs help from Stephenie Meyer. SMey is sort of remarkable in what she’s been able to do, but Austen has nearly two hundred years of awesome on her and she’s not going anywhere.
That said, Catherine Morland would have been all over the Twilight series, Breaking Dawn especially.
October 22nd, 2009 at 3:38 pm
That said, Catherine Morland would have been all over the Twilight series, Breaking Dawn especially.
Heh, this post is currently in the works.
October 22nd, 2009 at 5:09 pm
I personally love the Everyman’s Library (Knopf/Random House) – partially because I adore their books’ quality, but partially because they are very pretty while still being a bit more unique than “painting from roughly the same period” by the addition of the dots pattern. Unfortunately, though I own all seven of the Everyman’s collection, I bought the first six before the new design was available, so a) my set doesn’t match
and b) the old covers aren’t nearly as pretty.
The newer Penguin Classics are fairly nice looking, especially with the painting glossy and the black matte – but I don’t always like the choice of paintings very well.
The new Vintage Classics (also Random House) are very attractive, and have the benefit of being original (or original ish, compared to the glut of classic painting covers).
I do like the State Street covers, though I’ve never encountered them in person. I wasn’t a fan of the Penguin Deluxe Edition new cover, though – I didn’t like the monochrome, it was too Baroque and Burton-esque for my vision of Austen (who is much more neoclassical and modernist) – plus they completely stripped any introduction or notes from this edition. The paper quality and cover texture was very nice.
October 22nd, 2009 at 9:16 pm
I totally see what you’re saying, but I think like others mentioned — they are definitely trying to tap into that “twilight” teen-generation readership by mimicking the covers, and altho we may balk at this, I am all for luring young girls (ooh, does that sound lurid?) into picking up REAL literature. Jacket covers are meant to ENTICE arent they? So what Twi-hard wouldnt be enticed by these covers??
October 22nd, 2009 at 9:19 pm
PS loved the edward gorey reference! i need to pull out my “beastly baby” and show the girls — they will get a kick out of it.
October 23rd, 2009 at 8:38 am
Yeah. You know why they are doing this right? In the Twilight series Bella reads Wuthering Heights in Eclipse, and Romeo and Juliet in New Moon. I can’t remember if she was reading Pride and Prejudice in Twilight. But anyway, Meyer is supposed to have been inspired by those classics and wove parallels in the Twilight series. It’s still rather annoying that it’s such an obvious marketing tactic aimed at Twilight fans. *shakes head*.
October 23rd, 2009 at 12:00 pm
Malene, Miss Ball brought those AWESOME needlepoint books covers to our attention a while back, and I still love to look at them! That’s the type of thing I loved to do when I a design student, though I never crafted anything like that.
ibmiller, thanks for your links. I love the old-fashioned hard cover designs and would be tempted to get those. I also like the Everyman’s Library designs because I like those paintings, but I wish they’d change the title already–I’m not a man, and I have strong feelings about gathering books for my home library.
Jacqueline, yes, they’re clearly made to entire. I really do approve of that. In the end, I accept it if it means getting anyone to read more.
janicu, one of my friend mentioned exactly what you’re talking about when trying to entice me to read the books. And I love that Meyer does that. I just wish her books weren’t so often said to have such poor writing! At some point, I’m sure I’ll at least give the first book a go.
October 24th, 2009 at 2:31 pm
Here’s a great site with huge numbers of covers! LibraryThing
October 25th, 2009 at 10:51 am
I read all four of the books. ALL FOUR. I really liked Twilight and read it before the huge wave of popularity happened. I thought of it as just this cute high school romance where the normal girl gets the unattainable guy. But after people pointed out the weirdo relationship between Edward and Bella I could see it too, and I HATED New Moon because that one really highlighted how dependent Bella was and how the relationship was unhealthy. I forced myself to keep reading because my cousin gave me all the books and I felt obligated. The writing is OK, it’s the characters that drove me crazy! At least in the final one, everything was SO over the top that it got a bit better because I could just take it as pure ridiculous entertainment.
October 25th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
IBM – Mmmm, LibraryThing! Also, I meant to tell you that I really like the Knopf covers–I think Knopf is consistently the best in the business, cover-wise, to the point where I can nearly always identify a Knopf book by the prettiness of it. I hope they’re paying those designers well! (Also, I do like the Vintage Classics covers–but I think they’re the most likely to look dated in a few years.)
October 25th, 2009 at 11:11 pm
Very true about the Vintage covers – but at least they’ll still be pleasant.
November 15th, 2009 at 10:53 pm
Hi, I’m a big fan of Jane Austen – I recently just discovered these books in one of our local bookstores. I must agree with you. While I’ve decided to not “judge a book by its cover” and finally give the Twilight saga a chance, I think its publisher went overboard with this. You don’t promote a CLASSIC with a modern-day hit. Twilight and its author have a LOT to prove as opposed to literary PILLARS who’ve battled time itself and survived.
On another note, would love to repost (give credit and link to you of course) this in my blog. Thanks
March 12th, 2010 at 6:24 pm
“I’m also offended by the notion that Miss Austen needs help from Stephenie Meyer. SMey is sort of remarkable in what she’s been able to do, but Austen has nearly two hundred years of awesome on her and she’s not going anywhere.” – Ditto.
Following is my rant from elsewhere on this subject: “Eliza Bennett jut might retch if she were actual and found herself subject to a Facebook profile (“It’s complicated with Mr. F. Darcy) in the post-Twilight edition of Pride & Prejudice. The cover alone – with its white and blood red peonies cold against a black depth, framed by the declaration “THE LOVE THAT STARTED IT… ALL (really? started what, may I ask, given the ambiguous use of the pronoun “it”? Darcy and Eliza Bennett would sue for libel were they not fiction) – had me cringing that there’s yet another Twilight to be suffered. Indeed, according to this HarperTEEN edition, I can “discover the connections between Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy and Bella and Edward.” How I long for the days of literary yore when sunlight supposedly pulverized vampires. How I wish Jane Austen herself would rise from her grave, hunt down S. Meyer, and give the latter a taste of truly mordant wit.”
As for S. Meyers working in classic love stories into the Twilight series, that’s precisely the problem. She encourages her readers into regarding the relationship between Romeo & Juliet and Cathy & Heathcliff as, albeit darkly, ideal romances, as GREAT ROMANCES!!! Hello!! R&J got hitched within days and then offed themselves. And all this is entirely antithetical to Austen’s sensibilities as well as those of the hero & heroine of P&P.
Rant nearly over but as a tutor for teenagers, I find myself having to do a lot of damage control – both academic and interrelational – thanks to S. Meyer.
March 15th, 2010 at 7:40 am
Liz –
Preach it, sister!
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