True Notebooks by Mark Salzman

I very much enjoyed True Notebooks by Mark Salzman. Not only do I have a personal thing going on with Salzman, but he is a great writer and I always enjoy reading about inspiring teachers. This book is a true account of his experience as a volunteer writing tutor at Central Juvenile Hall in Los Angeles County. Despite his own reservations about teaching writing and the absurdity of a well-off white man thinking he can walk into a detention center for kids who have committed the most heinous crimes and teach them “art,” he and the boys come away from the experienced changed for the better. Only most of the boys leave the Juvenile Hall only to move to an adult penitentiary.

At any rate, I thought it was a good book when I read the Advance Reading Copy, but I didn’t hear much about it later. I guess it wasn’t that popular.

Recently, as I was reading Chip Kidd Work: 1986-2006, I came upon a page showing this cover design. I had not known it was by Chip Kidd. Kidd writes a little bit about each cover image and how it came about, and many of them are accompanied by a written excerpt from the author himself, talking about the cover. This page had a box of text written by Mark Salzman. I found it a bit enigmatic, and a maybe a little disturbing.

“Chip Kidd can make or break a book with his cover designs; that’s how powerful they are. In the spring of 2000 he designed the cover for Lying Awake, my book about a group of people (nuns) who sleep in cells, have no personal possessions, eat in silence, wear identical uniforms, and who cannot leave their walled community except by special permission. In the spring of 2003 he did the cover for True Notebooks, my book about a group of people (incarcerated juveniles) who sleep in cells, have no personal possessions, eat in silence, wear identical uniforms, and who cannot leave their walled community except by court order. Both books were poignant, thought-provoking, and life-affirming. Lying Awake flew out of the bookstores; True Notebooks sank like a stone.

How can we explain this? For the cover of Lying Awake, Chip selected a black-and-white photograph of a stark hallway in a convent, with a ghostly figure of a nun at the far end of the hall. You can’t quite see her face. For True Notebooks, he chose a black-and-white photograph of a stark hallway in a prison, with a ghostly figure of an inmate at the far end of the hall. You can’t quite see his face. Both beautiful images, both perfect representations of the themes encountered in the books. So far, so good. But what style of lettering did he choose for the titles? For Lying Awake, he used fragile, vulnerable letters in white, red and gold, evoking both the material world and the spiritual one, the sacred and the profane. They say to the reader: this is a book that goes right to the heart of the human condition. For True Notebooks, he used plump, jaunty lettering in colors reminiscent of childhood: cherry red, sky blue, lemon yellow. Set against the harsh prison image, they say to the reader: this book is about complexity. Was he right? Yes. Was he right to advertise this on the cover? The sales figures show that acknowledging complexity did for True Notebooks what it did for John Kerry.

Thanks, Chip Kidd.”

I agree with everything Salzman wrote in the first two paragraphs, but the last line bothers me. I don’t know whether it was intended to be a condemnation, a joke, or what. Was he blaming Chip Kidd for the poor sales of his book? You can see the two covers for yourselves. I personally do not like the cover design of True Notebooks, and I don’t think it does the book justice. In my opinion, saying that the rainbow lettering evokes complexity is being a bit generous. I think it looks childish. But how much really do the covers affect the sales?

Chip Kidds writes a response to Salzman, in which he explains that the similarities truly were a coincidence. He had simply found two very appropriate images for each book when he needed them, and did not notice the similarity until Salman pointed it out. About the sales, he writes, “Though I take umbrage with his theory on why the numbers on the titles were so disparate. He’s wrong… Two words I learned long ago: Nuns. Sell.”

True Notebooks by Mark Salzman

Tags: book+reviews juvenile+detention nuns cover+design Chip+Kidd Mark+Salzman