Book Covers

I was wandering through the UCLA bookstore the other day and came across a book I've been really wanting to read, but I found myself slightly turned.  This wasn't because I had a sudden twinge of repulsion to physical presence of the book or the price, but I didn't like the cover of the book.  

Now I know how the saying goes... "Don't judge a book by its cover..." but how can you not sometimes.  Aren't we all taught the importance of a good first impression?  Is that not what a book is giving us when we look at the cover and read the description on the back.  I'm going to have to clarify; I'm not saying a book has to have an amazing, artfully done cover in order for me to read it.  I actually really like the feel of an old hardcover with no cover - just the gilded lettering of the title and author along the spine.  This is a different kind of beast.  These older books weren't trying to sell anything other than the fiction or non-fiction that is inside.  But its different now.  Pretty much any recent publication of a book will have a thought out cover intended to grab the potential buyers attention.  As a reader and consumer I admit that I fall into this pit.  However, I really enjoy looking to see how an artist has interpreted the contents of the book.  It is extremely difficult to some up an entire book with one image.

The book I saw in the store was Blindness by Jose Saramago.  The cover turned me off.   It wasn't an original piece of artwork, but a movie flyer version of the book that had been re-printed after the release of the movie.  The cover features a giant gold sticker now proclaiming "Now a major motion picture" (implying the notion of well if they made it into a movie... it must be a good book) and the faces of famous people - Mark Ruffalo and Julianne Moore.  My biggest qualm with this is not the fact that the cover art has sold out in a sense (in order to gain the publisher more money through its new stars) but the fact that the reader's experience is slightly compromised.  Some may be able to overcome this obstacle but I have a difficult time doing so.  When I read this book now, I am not going to think of the main characters as my own creative projections of what Saramago is showing me, but as the character as played by Julianne Moore, or as played by Mark Ruffalo.  They no longer become independent characters for the reader to tease out, but like the movie, the reader has a sense that the character is being played in an odd complex way.  Its not the Doctor's Wife anymore.  In my mind it is Julianne Moore as the doctor's wife.  

The original cover of Blindness is below.  If you look at it and analyze it, it is very fitting for the novel.  It depicts the repetition of the word blindness, but with its repetition and pattern it represents the power of words to overcome the effect of the actual blindness, thus in the thick of the "unseeing" you can see through the density of words, one clear word - "blindness" - the title of the book.  Its interesting and deep and symbolic.  I think its what cover art should be.  It is a concept depicting the idea of the book.  It should be art, not just a poster of celebrities.

This blog is making me think about my conversations with CR about The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - the comparison of the story by Fitzgerald and the big screen adaptation... more to come soon...