Postcards from Penguin: A History of Recent Literature in 100 Paperback Covers

Yes, we’ve always been told not to judge a book by its cover. But you can make an exception when it comes to Penguin. The appearance on a book of that iconic little penguin encircled in orange has been a virtual guarantee of literary merit and reader enjoyment for three-quarters of a century. Started in 1935 by Allen Lane, a guy just looking for a good book to read on the train from Exeter to London, Penguin Books has published such luminaries as Virginia Woolf, W.H. Auden, and Graham Greene, but also a plethora of more surprising titles like Scootering, Soft Fruit Growing, Warfare by Words, and a biography of John Lennon.

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To celebrate their 75^th anniversary, the imprint has issued the covetable Postcards from Penguin: One Hundred Covers in One Box, which is exactly that: a collection of 100 amazing Penguin paperback covers, from classics to crime fiction, in postcard form, that happens to double as a fascinating overview of literary and graphic design history from nearly eight decades. It’s mesmerizing to shuffle through the stack and impossible to pick a favorite. Remember when "Please post" meant something else entirely? This treasure box just might inspire you to actually rediscover the beauty and brevity of a note handwritten in a three-by-five-inch space not to mention the lost art of philately.

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