“Deep-versed in books and shallow in himself.” John Milton

2nd May 2008

Following on from my France trip, one of the things that jumped out at me were the designs of their book covers… or rather, the lack of them. This isn't to say that the books all looked exactly the same, but it appeared that the French don't entirely follow our habit of ‘over-marketing' books. Many of the covers were quite plain, or had abstract designs or often had similar fonts and colours.

This aroused a desire in me that rarely happens in England : for the first time in years I was about to open a book without being entirely sure of what I would be getting. (My minimal grasp of French meant that my curiosity was instantly thwarted – but, nonetheless, this was a breakthrough!)

The skill of marketers in giving us what we want is very high and often removes the need for real creativity. Books are marketed to within an inch of their (short) lives: this includes not only the covers, but even the text.

To give an example of this, I was once asked, as a professional librarian, to fill in a questionnaire about what kind of books I would like to see being published. I was asked to tick boxes about the genres (Romance, Western, Sci-Fi etc), characters (male, female, young, old, disabled etc), settings (the desert, city, jungle) etc I would like to read. These preferences would then be given to writers who would write to order (a little like the Tin Pan Alley songwriters, I suppose).

I don't know whether they followed up my suggestion, but I'm still waiting for that Sci-Fi/Western novel set in the Antarctic, featuring an elderly Spanish detective and his pet bird.

Well, it sounded like a winning idea to me.

David H.