It could be argued that, generally speaking, the dust-jackets of Graham Greene’s novels are a bit – well, plain, to put it politely. In fact, he was very particular on this matter, perhaps thinking that a more sober wrapper added a certain gravitas. For example, he strongly disapproved of the suggested panoramic scene on the draft jacket design for The Honorary Consul and demanded it be discarded. And it was, of course. (Below is the abandoned draft and the substituted plain first edition dustjacket from 1973).
It comes as something of a surprise, therefore, that the thirteen titles in the Library Edition of the Works of Graham Greene, published by Heinemann on a rolling basis from 1959 onwards, all feature pictorial dustjackets – and are all the excellent work of artist Peter Edwards. Simon Brimson has drawn our attention to a fascinating article from 2015 by Nick Jones on the Existential Ennui website about these Library Editions which we thoroughly recommend. It can be accessed via this link: Nick Jones, ‘The Library Edition of the Works of Graham Greene, 1959-1960: Peter Edwards Dust Jackets’, Existential Ennui, 15 July 2015.
If you are thinking of building a collection of Greene’s books this would be an excellent starting point. The colourful and imaginative artwork of Peter Edwards would look really attractive on anyone’s bookshelf – and the books themselves aren’t bad either!
(Below, again for comparison, is the plain first edition of The Quiet American from 1955 and the later, Greene-approved Edwards dustjacket.)
