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Cover Art
Cover Art is a fairly new concept in the area of published manuscripts. Well, fairly new is a slight misconception. Book covers and cover art became something publishers realized they could use to sell books sometime around 1820. In the nineteenth century books went from covers designed to protect the pages inside to sales tools. This was due to the industrialized mechanisms used to print books and the materials used to bind them.
Gone were the heavy leather or vellum used to wrap around a book in a binding. Instead, printers and publishers were presented with a blank slate of paper to create a means to catch the reader’s eye. To draw them into piking up the book and looking inside.
Though it seems the book cover didn’t really come into its own until the turn of the century. The twentieth century. Here’s an example:
This is the cover of Jules Verne’s From The Earth to The Moon published in 1873. A far cry from the empty covers of the books before it. If you set this book next to a previous book with a leather cover and some imprinted artwork the reader will always choose something vibrant like this book cover. Now compare this to the 1855 version of Gulliver’s Travels.
Each of these draw the eye. Each makes the reader want to look inside. This is the purpose of a books cover art. To make the reader want to open the book. Period.
Let’s compare two covers of a classic book.
Quite the difference. The first one is from the age of the pulp novel. An attempt to draw in female readers to see what the bad boy D’Arcy is all about. Of course, in the time frame the book was written men didn’t smoke filtered cigarettes but, who cares? The cover sold books and introduced an entire legion of female readers to the indomitable Mr. D’Arcy of literary fame.
Cover art has progressed to the point the large publishing houses spend fortunes in research to see what sells and what doesn’t. Here at The Pyrateheart Press we employ a simpler method. We ask you. We show the cover for a book and ask for input. Like these:
These are two covers we created, by we I mean my wife Yvonne, for our upcoming releases in September and October. What do you think? Do they make you pause? Make you want to open them up and see what it’s all about? We thought so but WE don’t matter. You do, the reader. So? Tell us what you think.
Now how about one of the all-time favorite covers. Here’s the cover of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. Unchanged for over 88 years.
A cover which has stood the test of time. Now comes a question few can answer since so few spend so little time on who creates the cover art. Who’s your favorite? For me it’s Frank Frazetta but most prefer Chris Whelan. Don’t know who they are? Google them and see. You won’t be disappointed.
I’m Ross, The Editor-in Chief at The Pyrateheart Press and I’m out.
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