I'm obsessive with the publishers of the books I am reading. Most of the 
time when I'm buying books I'm forced to buy the worst one in the store because the worst editions do also happen to be the cheapest. So as a result, I have a whole collection of Penguin Popular Classics at home. I hate these editions so much. Seriously, the paper is bad, the words are so close to one another and so small that your eyes get blurry after a while, but I still continue buying them because its really hard to get a book cheaper than 2.50 euro. Anyways, if anyone does not have an idea of what I'm talking about, here's a picture of my Wuthering Heights edition. However much I dislike them, I have to admit it that sometimes they have good cover paintings like the Great Expectations one.
time when I'm buying books I'm forced to buy the worst one in the store because the worst editions do also happen to be the cheapest. So as a result, I have a whole collection of Penguin Popular Classics at home. I hate these editions so much. Seriously, the paper is bad, the words are so close to one another and so small that your eyes get blurry after a while, but I still continue buying them because its really hard to get a book cheaper than 2.50 euro. Anyways, if anyone does not have an idea of what I'm talking about, here's a picture of my Wuthering Heights edition. However much I dislike them, I have to admit it that sometimes they have good cover paintings like the Great Expectations one.
My favourite publisher is the black Penguin Classics. I love them. They're so expensive but beautiful. The picture on the cover is glossy and the lower black part of the cover is black. My Our Mutual Friend edition is worth dying for. Its a book of epic proportions (one of Dickens' longest I think) and so beautiful that I need to periodically cuddle it. That reminds me, yesterday my dad enters my room and finds my cuddling and sniffing my Our Mutual Friend and I think I managed to traumatize him for life with that creepy 
image. Its even got a great cover picture of the Thames. I love it. I don't like the green Penguin Classics (Twentieth Century) but love the silver ones. My Lolita cover is the green Penguin Twentieth Century Classics one and is the only green one that I love because when I went to the New York Metropolitan Museum last summer, I actually saw the real painting used for the cover picture. Seriously, I was so amazed that it was there that I think I spent 10 minutes just standing there with my mouth open in front of it (I bet loads of people around me thought that I was a lesbian perv drooling over a picture of a half naked child)My favourite cover of all times if the one I have for 
Swann's Way. Its the gray Penguin's Classics edition. Its so simple and beautiful and sums up the entire book in a picture. I adore it. Look at it, its just lovely and you can't even make out whether the man is walking towards you or away from you. Oh, also The Clockwork Orange silver edition is also beautiful, I don't own it so I'm not putting a picture of it here but its one of my favourites too. It shows an almost full/empty glass of milk against a grayish white background. On an completely unrelated note, I hate the green Wordsworth Classics however cheap they may be and refuse to buy them even if I'm rolling in the depths of poverty, but I don't mind the blue Wordsworth ones, they're alright.
Swann's Way. Its the gray Penguin's Classics edition. Its so simple and beautiful and sums up the entire book in a picture. I adore it. Look at it, its just lovely and you can't even make out whether the man is walking towards you or away from you. Oh, also The Clockwork Orange silver edition is also beautiful, I don't own it so I'm not putting a picture of it here but its one of my favourites too. It shows an almost full/empty glass of milk against a grayish white background. On an completely unrelated note, I hate the green Wordsworth Classics however cheap they may be and refuse to buy them even if I'm rolling in the depths of poverty, but I don't mind the blue Wordsworth ones, they're alright.Another thing I really like about the black Penguin Classics is the white paper and great font, direct quote from TPF "its so white that you have to stop sometimes in the middle of reading the book to admire its whiteness" unquote. Actually I quite like the Black Swan font too, but I doubt most people even know Black Swan, the publishing company, so it doesn't really matter.
I do realize I sound like an obsessive, maniac in the above post and most people don't even think of the publishers or the font before buying a book. If you think this was weird then someone should ask TPF my Half Blood Prince edition story. One day when I'm old and rich, instead of buying myself a Ferrari like most normal people, I'm definitely going to buy the entire black Penguin Classics collection with nice smelling white paper and then the Ferrari (obviously).
4 comments:
lol. I know what you mean. My mum's caught me sniffing my books waaay too often. She thinks I'm insane but I can't help it! I just love the smell of books. I even spray perfume on all the books in my collection periodically. everytime I take out a book I haven't read for ages, i sniff it first and it just smells amazing. I'm so obsessed I even have neem leaves in the pages of all my books coz I'll die if i see even one bookworm.
of course, I've never cuddled them so I have to say honey, you might be pushing it just a little bit.
My absolute favourite edition and cover is the silver Penguin Orlando with Tilda Swinton on the cover. We totally have to see that movie, BTW.
Yes, i love the Clockwork orange cover too. It's the whiteness of the milk, I think, which is so effective.
OMG, frankengirl, you're right! That whole Giles and books moment is truly awesome. Of course, there's not a single Buffy moment that isn't awesome, right Pan?
My edition of Swann's Way is coverless! Sniff!
Covers and publishers, hmm... not into them a lot. Though first editions are something that interests me (a lot). I always try to buy second hand books, partly because they are dirt cheap, partly because some people leave comments on the margins, partly because (again) of the smell. Apart from the glue, and the brand-newness that is common to all the freshly manufactured books, second hand books often smell like the houses they were in. Once I got a book that smelled a lot like cinnamon. I've a Stephen King that smells unmistakably like cigar smoke. You get the point. (Dunno but for some reason I'm leaving long comments?)
Eris - ha! you tell me that I'm pushing it and then spray perfume and put neem leaves in your books to prevent worms? That is completely normal and acceptable, isnt it?
Frankengirl - It is true what you said. I do get much more satisfaction when I use a book for research rather than the internet. The dusty feel of old books in your hands is just amazing. It is really magic, as you called it.
TPF - Buffy Rules! Definitely have to see Orlando. I love Tilda Swinton, she's my favourite character in the Narnia movie. Your Swann's Way is just too blue to be true. Its quite ugly actually.
Nitin - I actually have quite a collection of second hand books. Apart from the fact that they're really cheap, they definitely do smell really nice. They smell of something other than just paper, I know what you mean. I also love the yellowness of the paper of old books and the feeling that a lot of people have read this book before me and (hopefully) enjoyed it.
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