Book Jackets :: Essays Papers

Book JacketsBook treetop, apply subdue, dust jacket, dust cover. They ar all words that describe one pretty innocuous subject the thing that covers the hard cardboard cover of a intensity. The book jacket was developed for practical purposes only to protect books from dust, insects and other harmful entities. However, as years progressed, the book jacket has become a separate spokesperson of the book itself and the reading experience. The book jacket has morphed into not only an accompaniment used to help sell the book, but also into a gentleman of art in and of itself. Classic books such as Ralph Ellisons The Invisible earth , Joseph Hellers Catch-22 and newer titles such as Michael Crichtons Jurassic Park and Chuck Palahniuks Lullaby . Theres til now a celebrity book jacket designer in our thick its hard to miss Chip Kidd and his eclectic and eye catching designs gracing the shelves of bookstores and libraries cross moods the country and the world. The book jacket has c ome a long way since its early inception as a protector of books it has become the commencement exercise step in the reading experience.Although book covers have been decorated for galore(postnominal) years, it wasnt until the 1800s that book jackets came into existence. Book jackets first appeared in England in the nineteenth century, in a culture that was still discovering the rules of consumerism. Their early evolution came about in fits and starts, constrained by cultural inhibitions that are now difficult to understand. When palm tree was present on the outside of the book, it took the form of either blocking onto covering cloth, or pasting printed paper sheets onto the front and back boards (Powers 6). Up until the advent of book jackets at this time, the decorated covers of books were quite popular and even produced celebrities of book cover design. Aubrey Beardsley and Sarah Wyman Whitman were popular book cover designers of the 1800s. Pasted paper designs started appear ing on books as early as the 1830s which soon gave way to two modify text editionured designs and gold stamping in the 1840s and 1850s. As the years progressed, the use of text and colored ink was simplified and became commonplace on book covers about the world. The transformation of book design owed much to the Arts and Crafts movement, which revered the book as an object both functional and aesthetic, a part of chance(a) life yet worthy of care and adornment.