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Why is Classic Literature Seeing such a Revival?

Thanks to Project Gutenberg many of us need never buy another classic novel, and yet figures show that the sales are well up of actual hard copies of classic books, and this is being put down to several things.

To start with television adaptations like the recent adaptations of War and Peace and Poldark for instance do dead authors and their sales the world of good, but it still doesn’t explain why people don’t just choose the Kindle version for free, or at least very cheaply.

Well we have our own theory on this. Many years ago, many people said that the Internet would kill off reading books, then that eBooks would kill of physical books, but what has actually happened is, the Internet has made reading cool again!

Years ago you might have been the only bibliophile you knew, but thanks to the net you can now log on and make virtual friends who love all the same things as you do. With so many bookish sites, Instagram and online communities, like our own for instance, books have never looked so good.

In fact books are damn sexy and it’s about time the world caught up!

Second hand Penguin books have never been so popular, and beautiful hardback gilded covers are now sought out over the free eBook version. This has led to many brands working even harder on reimagining classic covers, a blessing and a curse to those book lovers trying to decide between them.

Just last year Penguin brought out its Little Black Collection, offering stylish paperbacks of old classics starting from just 80p, and they have flown off the shelves and exceeded expectations selling 3 million copies worldwide.

This also seems to indicate that covers don’t necessarily need to be modern and fancy, and that book lovers actually prefer a classic cover that will stand the test of time.

What publishers of classic literature do seem to have learned is that movie covers are a big no no. Browse the shelves for Penguin, Vintage Classics, Folio, Everyman and many other classic publishers and you won’t see an actress in sight, what you will see is some of the most stylish and beautifully timeless covers the publishing industry has ever seen!

Put simply, reading real books is sexy again and no one wants to Instagram their Kindle!



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