Lorca: Three Tragedies
Alvin LustigThe 1953 paperback cover for Lorca: Three
Tragediesdesigned by Alvin Lustig ( 1915 –
1955 ) is a masterpiece of symbolic acuity,
compositional strength, and typographic
ingenuity. It is also the basis for a great
many contemporary book jackets and
paperback covers. The American book
jacket designers’ preference, in the late
1980 s and 1990 s, for fragmented images,
minimal typography, and rebus-like
compositions can be traced directly to the
stark black-and-white cover for Three
Tragedies. This and other distinctive
jackets and covers designed by Lustig for
New Directions transformed the
photograph into a tool for abstraction
through the use of reticulated negatives,
photograms, and setups.
Lustig’s approach developed
from an interest in photomontage originally practiced by the European
moderns, and particularly the American expatriate E. McKnight Kauffer.
When Lustig introduced this technique to American book publishing in
the late 1940 s, book covers and jackets were predominantly illustrative and
rather decorative, with an abundance of hand-lettered novelty faces. The
Lorca cover was a grid of five symbolic photographs tied together in poetic
disharmony. Before this type of cover was introduced, European art-based
approaches were not even considered by American publishers. Perhaps they
were thought foolhardy in a marketplace where hard-sell marketing
conventions were rigorously adhered to. Or, just as likely, the leading book
jacket designers of the day were ignorant of such methods.
Lustig rejected the typical literary solution that summarized a
book through one generalized image. “His method was to read a text and
get the feel of the author’s creative drive, then to restate it in his own
graphic terms,” wrote James Laughlin, the publisher of New Directions, in
“The Book Jackets of Alvin Lustig” (Print, Vol. 10 ,No. 5 , October 1956 ).
Laughlin hired Lustig in the early 1940 s giving him the latitude to204