Saturday 11 July 2020

An Experiment with Covers

I have in my library a number of old paperbacks with rather fine covers. These do not depict directly the contents of the book, but are rather patterns, abstract or otherwise. Here is one of these.

Now, you will note that this is the back cover, lacking the title. I wonder if those seeing these for the first time can identify the writers or subjects or time periods that these books discuss just by seeing these characterful covers. So take a look and put your answers in the comments.





I shall say that these are all volumes of poetry, generally by English-speaking authors, largely from after the 16th century.




It would be wildly optimistic of me to expect that you will get it spot on. But it will be interesting to see how close you get.


These last two have price labels printed as part of the cover.
Could this be of any assistance? Who knows! 


2 comments:

  1. Answers, as no-one has ventured a guess thus far.

    In order as above:
    The Penguin Poets D38: The Metaphysical Poets
    The Penguin Poets D15: Gerard Manley Hopkins
    The Penguin Poets D42: William Blake
    The Penguin Poets D39: Robert Graves
    The Penguin Poets D25: Matthew Arnold
    The Penguin Book of Australian Ballads
    D65: The Penguin Book of Chinese Verse
    The Penguin Poets: John Donne

    Blake and the Book of Chinese Verse are perhaps the most obvious out of these, but there is something Jacobean in that design for Donne.

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