Native Speaker (Penguin Drop Caps) - Hardcover

Lee, Chang-rae; Hische, Jessica

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0143124307 ISBN 13: 9780143124306

Publisher: PENGUIN GROUP USA, 2013

Synopsis

From A to Z, the Penguin Drop Caps series collects 26 unique hardcovers--featuring cover art by Jessica Hische

It all begins with a letter. Fall in love with Penguin Drop Caps, a new series of twenty-six collectible and hardcover editions, each with a type cover showcasing a gorgeously illustrated letter of the alphabet. In a design collaboration between Jessica Hische and Penguin Art Director Paul Buckley, the series features unique cover art by Hische, a superstar in the world of type design and illustration, whose work has appeared everywhere from Tiffany & Co. to Wes Anderson's recent film Moonrise Kingdom to Penguin's own bestsellers Committed and Rules of Civility. With exclusive designs that have never before appeared on Hische's hugely popular Daily Drop Cap blog, the Penguin Drop Caps series launches with six perennial favorites to give as elegant gifts, or to showcase on your own shelves.

L is for Lee. Korean American Henry Park is "surreptitious, B+ student of life, illegal alien, emotional alien, Yellow peril: neo-American, stranger, follower, traitor, spy..." or so says his wife, in the list she writes upon leaving him. Henry is forever uncertain of his place, a perpetual outsider looking at American culture from a distance. And now, a man of two worlds, he is beginning to fear that he has betrayed both and belongs to neither. Chang-Rae Lee's first novel Native Speaker is a raw and lyrical evocation of the immigrant experience and of the question of identity itself.

About this title

Review:

Winner of the 2012 Fifty Books/Fifty Covers show, organized by Design Observer in association with AIGA and Designers & Books

Winner of the 2014 Type Directors Club Communication Design Award

Praise for Penguin Drop Caps:

"[Penguin Drop Caps] convey a sense of nostalgia for the tactility and aesthetic power of a physical book and for a centuries-old tradition of beautiful lettering."
--Fast Company

"Vibrant, minimalist new typographic covers.... Bonus points for the heartening gender balance of the initial selections."
--Maria Popova, Brain Pickings

"The Penguin Drop Caps series is a great example of the power of design. Why buy these particular classics when there are less expensive, even free editions of Great Expectations? Because they're beautiful objects. Paul Buckley and Jessica Hische's fresh approach to the literary classics reduces the design down to typography and color. Each cover is foil-stamped with a cleverly illustrated letterform that reveals an element of the story. Jane Austen's A (Pride and Prejudice) is formed by opulent peacock feathers and Charlotte Bronte's B (Jane Eyre) is surrounded by flames. The complete set forms a rainbow spectrum prettier than anything else on your bookshelf."
--Rex Bonomelli, The New York Times

"Drool-inducing."
--Flavorwire

"Classic reads in stunning covers--your book club will be dying."
--Redbook

About the Author:

Chang-Rae Lee is the author of A Gesture Life, Native Speakers, Aloft and The Surrendered. He won the Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award, among other honors, for his novel Native Speaker, and was selected by the New Yorker as one of the twenty best American writers under forty. His novels have also won Asian American Literary Award, the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature, and other awards. The Surrendered was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. He lives in New Jersey with his family.

Jessica Hische is a letterer, illustrator, typographer, and web designer. She currently serves on the Type Directors Club board of directors, has been named a Forbes Magazine "30 under 30" in art and design as well as an ADC Young Gun and one of Print Magazine's "New Visual Artists." She has designed for Wes Anderson, McSweeney's, Tiffany & Co, Penguin Books and many others. She resides primarily in San Francisco, occasionally in Brooklyn.

About this edition

• Publisher: PENGUIN GROUP USA
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 0143124307
• ISBN 13: 9780143124306
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 1