Ruben Toledo Covers the Classics

Looking to convince some aesthetically astute youngsters to read the classics? Penguin can help. The publisher recruited one of our favorite graphic artists, Ruben Toledo, to create illustrations for the covers of a new trio of Penguin Classics, reports Galleycat senior editor Ron Hogan (via Nylon). In addition to Emily Brontë‘s Wuthering Heights (at left), Toledo brought his signature à la mode elegance to The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne and Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. Part of the Penguin Classics Deluxe Editions line, the books will be published in late August, just in time to entice back-to-school shoppers.

Penguin has previously recruited the likes of Chris Ware, Seth, and Roz Chast to illustrate Deluxe Classics covers. One of our all-time favorites, despite (or perhaps because of) our vegetarian tendencies: Charles Burns‘s striking carcass cover for a 2006 edition of The Jungle, muckracker Upton Sinclair‘s slaughterhouse exposé.

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