I liked Biblioaddicts article on book covers quoting Orhan Pamuk's Other Colors: Essays and a Story (I've just put in an advance order for the paperback edition which comes out in November). I like the Pamuk quote, "successful book covers serve as conduits, spiriting us away from the ordinary world in which we live, ushering us into the world of the book".
Certainly, Penguin Books seem to have taken this concept to heart in their Great Ideas series, particularly in the case of this Proust text on the topic of "reading".
A little research (well, if you can call Googling around research) brought up the website of the designer of the Great Ideas series, David Pearson. Just click on any of the links to reveal a whole set of excellent designs most of which would make me want to own the book concerned.
I've written before on the pleasure of owning and handling books, and having read Bibiloaddicts article, I glanced around my shelves to look for examples of books which have made me want to own them or otherwise because of their covers.
I discovered that one designer who appeals to me particularly is Ken Leeder whose work for Richard Zimler has been pretty exceptional in my view, and definitely drew me to read my first Zimler book, The Seventh Gate and discoverery of his excellent series on the history of a family of Portuguese Jews over several centuries of Kabbalistic wisdom and appaling persecution.
