As long as we’re on the topic of the slow but inevitable digitisation of the known universe, let us take a moment to imagine the effect it has upon an author. Lionel Shriver, author of the 2005 Orange Prize Award-Winning We Need to Talk About Kevin, has a particular observation about the effect of the computerisation on the publishing industry. And no, it’s not the impact of composing on a laptop using the wireless in a coffee shop, or the future of book signings in a world of e-books.
Ms. Shriver (who changed her name from ‘Margaret Ann’ at the age of fifteen because she thought men had it easier in the world) would like to draw attention to deficiencies of computer graphics in creating cover art. She reminisces about her first couple of books, whose covers bore original art truly expressive of the stories contained inside. She goes on to explain the transformation of computer graphics:
Yet my latter covers have all capitulated to the computer. By the 1990s, designers were glued to their screens. If you scan Waterstone’s today, you will be hard pressed to find any covers employing original art. … For the most part, designers now just drag photos off the web, and play with backgrounds and fonts at the keyboard. That’s why a strange drabness, coldness, and sameness is plaguing the aesthetics of book publishing - and at a time when the pleasures of physical books, as opposed to electronic media, are vital to defend.
The neccessary relationship between the work of art inside and the work of art outside is maligned when one is the product of human being’s most visceral creative powers, and the other looks a bit, perhaps, airbrushed. Flaws and irregularities, Shriver contends, lend objects the mystery that we recognise as beauty.
She takes care to point out that she’s “not one to complain about the advent of the computer overall, which has made writing so much more convenient.” She’s simply frustrated because the last thirteen covers for her new book that her publisher has suggested have not worked, and no one appears to be heeding her requests for original art. That’s why, she explains, “at my wit’s end this last weekend, I…hauled out my coloured pencils. I drew my own damn book cover - luminous, one-of-a-kind, and…not quite perfect. We’ll see if my publisher bites. Call me a Luddite if you will - at least I tried.”
Read her full article in the Guardian, entitled ‘Now that pixels have replaced pencils the art of drawing has vanished. I’m so exasperated I’m designing my own book cover’ here, or read interviews and a biography at HarperCollins.