Comments on: 'Woefully Underconceptualised': Rick McGrath on J.G. Ballard's Cover Art

By: Phil Huntley

Phil Huntley — Fri, 15 Jun 2007 16:06:32 +0000

Further to my previous comment(and more to the point)I have always been fond of the dust-jacket to the UK hardback edition of ‘The Kindness of Women’ by Peter Maynard, while Stuart Haygarth’s excellent collage that makes up the DJ for the UKHB of ‘User’s Guide To The Millenium’ gets my vote for the best Ballard cover of them all!
It does seem however that music and film have this marketing/identity thing sussed out a lot better than most publishers and authors.I suppose most novelists leave things like cover design to their publishers with the usual very mixed results.Rock people and film-makers however seem less distanced from such concerns-think of the lengths Kubrick went to in order to wrest promotion of his films from the Warner Bros.marketing people…
I suppose it’s particularly frustrating that Ballard is so poorly served by his publishers as he is an author who is so oriented toward both visual and popular culture.
Finally I agree with Rick McGrath that the best Ballard paperback covers were the superb (and classy) David Pelham series in the seventies…

By: Phil Huntley

Phil Huntley — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 10:46:29 +0000

There is a CD cover for an album called ‘Sci-Fi Lullabies’ by the English rock band Suede-a great photo of a crashed jet rotting in a field-which I have always wished had adorned the cover of J G’s complete collected stories (would have been a better title for the collection too..)
I assume singer/songwriter Brett Anderson is a big JG fan…

By: johnny

johnny — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 14:48:37 +0000

Another cover I quite like is for the hardback HIGH-RISE, published by Holt, Rinehart and Wilson 1977. Jacket illustration by Carlos Ochagavia.

By: Supervert

Supervert — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 15:19:30 +0000

If there were an award for Writer Most Abused by His Publisher’s Designers, Ballard would have to receive the lifetime achievement award. Seriously, the packaging on 90% of his work is fucking hideous. It’s a real testament to his prose that you stomach some of those cover illustrations to read it.

Whenever I’ve stumbled across an advance proof or reader’s copy of a Ballard work — which isn’t often — I’ve snapped it up. It’s better to have a plain-jane copy of the book than to have one of those abortions of publication design. For that reason, I’m inclined to say that the “bilious yellow” Gollancz edition of Drowned World isn’t that bad. At least it doesn’t leave some goofy, impertinent image floating around in your head as you read the book.

By: johnny

johnny — Sat, 03 Mar 2007 00:24:13 +0000

A highly enjoyable and facinating piece. It prompted me to get my Ballard books out and look them over. One of my favorite covers is by Grizelda Holdermess for the J.M. Dent & Sons Ltd 1985 VERMILION SANDS

By: r.m. morrow

r.m. morrow — Thu, 01 Mar 2007 01:19:18 +0000

Highly enjoyable! Thank you!

These words, these images…bound up in high quality leather and acid-free paper would make for an…unusual…compelling…coffee-table book.

By: Kuja

Kuja — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 21:45:55 +0000

Superb work! Thanks!

By: Alex

Alex — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 11:11:24 +0000

SF covers tend to be awful, something I remember broaching with Kathryn Cramer. There seems to be a publisher default setting that “if it’s sci-fi it must be space opera, or else fantasy, so masses of airbrush purple wank it is.”

Hence hordes of titles that look embarrassing to be seen with in public. This also happens to anything concerning war – Adam Roberts’ The Wonga Coup, his excellent account of the Simon Mann/Mark Thatcher coup attempt in Equatorial Guinea, was given a dire black-and-flame theme appropriate to sub-Andy McNab SAS porn, and General Sir Rupert Smith’s The Utility of Force got a similar treatment in hardback.

Rushing to Paradise was good, and looks like a high-end tour brochure, which is very Ballardian indeed.

By: FJ Torres

FJ Torres — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 02:06:33 +0000

Amazing. Very specific and exhaustive analysis. A joy to read.
Thanks.