Judging Book by Its Cover: The Professor's House (Willa Cather)

Judging Book by Its Cover is a blog feature where I analyze book cover art, compare it with its content, as well as with covers from few other editions.

Book summary:
"Professor Godfrey St. Peter is a man in his fifties who has devoted his life to his work, his wife, his garden, and his daughters, and achieved success with all of them. But when St. Peter is called on to move to a new, more comfortable house, something in him rebels. And although at first that rebellion consists of nothing more than mild resistance to his family's wishes, it imperceptibly comes to encompass the entire order of his life. The Professor's House combines a delightful grasp of the social and domestic rituals of a Midwestern university town in the 1920s with profound spiritual and psychological introspection." - Amazon

My own review

My copy is a Vintage Classics edition of 1990

While I love flowers, including flowers in cover arts, I don't think these four flower stalks in the cover do any justice to the book at all. It feels like the designers were run out of idea and just threw four flowers to fill the otherwise blank spot. Esthetically it's not really pretty, and it has no meaning whatsoever. I hate it when publishers/designers do this!


Now, let's pick three more cover arts from different editions.

The Kindle edition, published by Open Road Media in 2021

This one is really interesting. There is two images instead of one, and it looks like two layers of wallpaper on the wall. The outer layer's is that of a study (with the wooden desk and chair, and books on the shelves). A professor's study would look like this. Then someone tore it open, revealing another one with unrelated picture of a cliff city.

This cover art truly represents the book; with the story of Tom Outland and the ancient remains of a cliff city he'd found in the Blue Messa. In term of relevance, we can tick it off. But from the aesthetic point of view, I don't think it looks appealing on a book. It's rather ambiguous, instead.

The Virago edition, 2006

I like the simplicity of this cover. The bareness of the room and the very uncomfortable wooden chair reflected Professor St. Peter's old house, from which he's supposed to move out. There's also the sense of emptiness of abandoned room, and loneliness too. It's very relevant with the tone of the story. However, as cover art, it makes the book seems too depressing, that I don't think I would ever pick it if I've found it on display at a bookstore.

The alternate edition from Vintage Classics, 1990

I have saved the best for last. This is my cover art champion! I love the faded brush strokes effect that gives the sense of dreaminess which retired people often feels of their world - like their influences in the world is receding. I love also the stretch of landscape view from the window.

Then there's the mannequin bust - which looks misplaced in a Professor's room, but actually in accordance with the story. I love how the mannequin bust (or the form, as Professor St. Peter and Augusta the sewing woman call it) seems to be an integral part of the study, instead of accessory, so that if you don't pay minute attention of it, you won't notice anything wrong. And that's how one should do a cover art - beautiful, yet relevant to the story.


What do you think? If you have read the book, which cover art do you think truly represents the story? And if you haven't, which one appeal to you most?