posted on 22 Dec 2018

Classic Covers: Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

Huxley’s novel of a future dystopia seems to especially attract book designers and book jacket artists who want to engage in a bold or daring conceptualisation of the author’s vision. There must be literally hundreds of different cover designs that have appeared over the decades since it was first published but, in my view, none of them better the original 1932 jacket conceived and executed by the artist, Leslie Holland.

Holland (1907 – 2005) trained at the Royal College of Art and, as the website for the Purton Artists Society tells us:

“he embarked on a career as commercial artist, entering the world of illustration and design. He produced posters for London Transport, greetings telegrams for the Royal Mail, and a number of designs for book jackets, including the highly-praised cover for the first edition of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. But he never read the book.”

Some jacket designs seem to help define the way a novel is perceived – which is, I think, especially true in this case. In addition, Holland’s artwork seems to dominate the imagination of many of the artists who have followed in his wake. You’ll find plenty of references to this original in the designs that have come along subsequently and which seem to offer something of a homage.

So what is it that makes this this particular iteration of the jacket so iconic? For me it’s the perfect blend of design elements that suggest both the excitement of futurism and the (then) cutting edge modernity of Art Deco. The globe seems to be suspended on a tangible axis that cuts into an upper and lower band of waves of some description – are these radio waves or radiation belts maybe? The globe itself has a similar hazy periphery that may again be symbolic of radio or even television signal broadcasts. Set in profile against the backdrop of the globe as seen from outer space – which would be the viewer’s perspective – is an aeroplane, a newly expanding technology in the 1930s that held the promise of fast, global travel. More sinisterly though, it also holds the prospect of global warfare and destruction.

The stylising of the globe, cut as it is into bands with sharp boundaries, is pure Art Deco and this is an effect made more dramatic by the contrasting blocks of white and midnight blue colour. The back panel of the book has no image or text but the undulating ‘radio-waves’ continue to ripple through the deep blue background.

The design could, in other circumstances, be taken as an advertising poster for a newly established airline and there is a rather eerie echo of the ‘global village’ that improved travel and communication will create – with this book jacket we’re looking into the future and, according to Huxley, that future will be a technological dystopia.

Finding copies of Brave New World with its original dust jacket has become very difficult indeed and to find one in excellent or near fine condition almost impossible. The desirability of the jacket makes a genuinely whopping difference to the price you’d pay to have one in your collection – we’re talking here of the difference between a first edition without a jacket priced at a few hundred pounds and one with a jacket in good shape at a few thousand.

As I write this piece I am looking across the room to a poster-sized reproduction of this book jacket on my wall. The artwork survives being enlarged in this way without losing its integrity but I have to say it's really a second best and that a first edition of this book with this dust jacket would be quite high on my wish-list of must have treasures.

 

Terry Potter

December 2018

(Click on an image below to view them in a slide show format)