Tobermory and other stories. Saki. 1998. Cover Diana Ong / SuperStock.
Fondation Foudroyée. Isaac Asimov. 1983. Cover Hubert de Lartigue.
Death Comes For The Archbishop. Willa Cather. 1990. Cover Ann Gold.
We have you covered…
Today’s post features artwork spanning seven decades of book publishing – luxuriate yourselves in this selection of book covers plucked straight from the shelves of TVTA!
Some titles will be instantly recognisable, others quite obscure, some have been adapted for stage, film or television, but all are equal here in having wonderful covers to bind their tales.
Enjoy your book.
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- Les Thanatonautes. Bernard Werber. 1994. Cover Christian Broutin.
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- Brave New World. Aldous Huxley. 2007.
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- Star Wars. George Lucas. 1977. Cover Wojtek Siudmak.
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- Le Moineau de Dieu. Mary Doria Russell. 1996. Cover Wojtek Siudmak.
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- Animal Farm. George Orwell. Cover Richard Parent.
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- 2013 Penguin. Cover by David Pearson.
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- Goodbye, Columbus. Philip Roth. 1962. Cover Gérard Failly.
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- Johnny Got His Gun. Dalton Trumbo. 1989.
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- Walden. Henry David Thoreau. 1949.
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- Fiesta. Ernest Hemingway. 1963.
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- Monkey Planet. Pierre Boulle. 1975. Cover Ian Vaughan.
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- Starship Troopers. Robert A. Heinlein. 1997.
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- Les fourmis. Bernard Werber. 1991. Cover Michel Tcherevkoff / TIB.
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- L’Ultime Secret. Bernard Werber. 2001. Cover David Bakonyi.
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- Vendredi. Michel Tournier. 1972.
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- Monkey. Wu Ch’êng-ên. 1977. Cover – Chinese carving depicting the Legend of the Monkey.
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- Displaced Person. Lee Harding. 1988. Cover David Wood.
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- Nous n’irons plus au Bois. Mary Higgins Clark. 1992.
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- The Golden Apples. Eudora Welty.
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- Que L’Ange Regarde de ce Coté. Thomas Wolfe. 1968. Cover Mario Solomos.
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- Lady Chatterley’s Lover. D.H. Lawrence. 1968. Cover Heather Mansell and Stephen Russ.
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- New Selected Poems. Ted Hughes. 1995. Cover courtesy Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew.
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- Waiting for the Barbarians. J.M. Coetzee. 1982. Cover Bascove.
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- Life of Pi. Yann Martel. 2003. Cover Andy Bridge.
Thank you for staring longingly at the cover with us 🙂
All images scanned from books selected from the collection of TVTA.
Chip Kidd quote art courtesy of quotefancy.com
The Vintage Toy Advertiser 
Some real classic reads in that collection
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Cheers, Neil.
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I like all of the covers, very neat.
You picked the perfect one to open with.
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Thank you. Saki’s short stories were a gift to me at aged 19 by a dear friend who opened my eyes. Very influential stories for me in my early years of writing!
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I know I’m repeating myself, but hats off for bringing forth the creators of the covers.
In an age of generic attirude etc thank ___ (fill in the blank accordingly) for those who tend to the creative flames.
Keep the fire burning my friend ☺
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Thanks man! It was good that nearly all the books I selected had credited the artists and designers. It’s always a bit of a head scratcher why some books don’t credit the covers?
Another thing that struck me is how the artwork can change completely depending on which country the book’s released in, and if it’s a new edition… unlike, say, album art, which generally remains the same throughout its lifetime. Would be cool to collect some of the many variation covers of a favourite novel!
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Hi TVTA, there are some nice covers that do indeed form a Haiku of the contents, then there are some that left me wondering! “The Life of Pi” was instantly recognisable as was “La Guerre des Etoiles” and Monkey Planet….though I don’t remember the wardrobe for Star Wars being that revealing! (I owned the English typefaced version of this book).
Fantastic collection as always, thanks for sharing.
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Cheers FT. Love Life of Pi – one of my favourite novels. There are rather a lot of books on the TVTA shelves, and I could have easily kept going with the scans. Maybe a part two another time.
The Wojtek Siudmak cover for Star Wars is pretty mad isn’t it, with Luke looking more like He-Man than the skinny farmboy we came to know. Love also how you can only see Ben’s head at the bottom of the artwork 🙂 You must have owned the original 1976 copy, as mine is a French translation from the year after. Although credited as written by Lucas, the novel was Ghostwritten by Alan Dean Foster, according to Wikipedia.
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Hello again, a part two would be good! And regards the Star Wars novel, unfortunately due to house moves and life I don’t have the book any more to confirm details. I just know it looks way out there. Alan Dean Foster is well known as a Star Wars novelisation writer, he wrote the novel for The Force Awakens. I didn’t know he was responsible for ghosting Star Wars – he did write the spin off story “Splinter of the Mind’s Eye” which was part of the Expanded Universe,
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Splinter is an often talked-about book for SW isn’t it. Haven’t read it myself. Brilliant that Alan Dean Foster has kept up the writing since the very beginning then.
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Yes, I need to add Splinter to my collection but as I have mentioned before finding bargains in my neighbourhood doesn’t happen very often. And I have the volunteers in the charity second hand shops on the look out for SW content for me!
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I miss visiting charity shops. Always nice to find something interesting and no longer used/wanted, then put the money for it to a good cause. Good call to hook up with the volunteers for any SW stuff 🙂
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One of the shops near to me have a big SW thing going on actually. You might recall I featured “The Sentinel Squad UK” in a post a while back, well this Star Wars Costuming/Trooping group regularly do fundraising events for the charity. So the staff in the shop know I know the group and they help me out. They are great.
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Some great choices and beautiful work here. Thanks
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Thank you, John. It was fun putting this post together, and I could have easily kept going with the scans from all the books we have here!
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