Laughter in the Dark cover

I'm thrilled to bits with the specimen-case Vintage reissues: they're elegant, they're lovely, and they're lepidopterally-minded without hitting your head over with it with a whole bunch of butterflies. I don't think there's getting away from the motif, at any rate, and besides John Gall did a terrific job of using it to generate a coherent, immediately identifiable set. (I'm way indebted to Gerard Genette in my dissertation, so the moment I hear "covers" I immediately think of his Paratexts.)

I'll be reposting a couple of less coherent, less immediately identifiable covers from a section of the site that was shunted over into Tripod ages ago. Since then, there's been a bunch of folk who've done a far more impressive job of collecting Nabokov covers. My own little collection, Postcards, is still around, but it's way smaller and way less comprehensive than A Nabokov Coverage and Zimmer's Covering Lolita: both are impressive, the former particularly for its extensive dedication to international editions.

• Addenda: More cover discussions today -- not on Nabokov but on the A-Frame. Click here for an explanation and an analysis and here for an extensive gallery.
• Even more addenda! (Via the VN Wikipedia entry.) More Nabokov covers! Robert Nelson's Vladimir Nabokov Writings - First Appearance Database (First Book/Pamphlet Appearances of Nabokov Writings)