Case 4
- Design and Promotion
Rudolf Olden, Hitler the pawn. (1936). LBC 943.086 HIT (OLD)
Gollancz had the uncanny knack of selecting the ‘right’ titles to publish. He was also visionary in one other aspect of publishing: typography. He once wrote: ‘It is the proper business of effective business printing to include provocation among its consistent virtues… to be effective, you must surprise – startle.’ The result: the LBC book jackets were produced in bold types, black and magenta, on bright yellow paper. Designed by the pioneer typographer Stanley Morison, a director in the firm, the layout of jacket for each title was distinctive and easily recognisable. It was an enormously successful marketing and publicity strategy. Although the titles in Heritage Collections lack their original dust-jackets, Rudolf Olden’s Hitler the pawn (1936) gives a good indication of the effectiveness of Morison’s design.
F. Elwyn Jones, The battle for peace. (1938). LBC 940.52 ELW
Membership of LBC was relatively simple. Each member was asked to subscribe to the club for a minimum of six months. They were required to accept the club’s ‘Book of the Month’ choice for which they paid 2s 6d. Most were commissioned new titles by Gollancz and simultaneously published in hard cover at 4 or 5 times the price. Every LBC book had printed on its cover: ‘Left Book Club Edition. Not For Sale to the Public’. On display with F. Elwyn Jones’s The battle for peace – the August 1938 ‘Book of the Month’ – is one of the 1000s of leaflets that Gollancz distributed. Aside from the title details, there is the usual drumming up of membership.
‘Free Book Offer’ for Elwyn Jones, The battle for peace. (1938)
‘Please Club membership’ leaflet. (1936)
The drive for LBC membership was aggressive. At one point, it was calculated, that 140,000 enrolment forms were sent out to prospective members and 87,000 to booksellers. Indeed, every book going out had a 4-page insertion – a ‘Please leaflet’ with the phrase ‘Please use this leaflet to get a new member’ and accompanying details of the Club, its origins, its publications, and how to join instructions. There were also LBC posters, streamers, and circulars. At the end of 1936, LBC membership grew to 40,000. By 1939, it was 57,000. These ephemeral leaflets were found loosely tipped in a number of Heritage Collections’ titles.
‘Please Club membership’ leaflet. (1936)
‘Please Club membership’ leaflet. (1936)
Victor Gollancz, ‘Important’ leaflet. Southampton: Camelot Press Ltd, c. March 1938
Gollancz’s most successful initiative to increase awareness and membership of the LBC was The Left News, which contained political articles and notices of new books and reviews. It also gave information on why the Book of the Month had been selected. The Left News was intensely personal. It spurred to action. It was first and foremost Gollancz. On 24 June 1936, in the second number of The Left News, he was able to write: ‘By post we have received 600 applications for membership’. Membership was predominately middle-class, and although somewhat unsuccessful with the core of the working class, its members included taxi drivers, medical students, railway workers, men and women in factory and trade unions, teachers, and a wide range of professionals, artists, poets, and musicians. On display is a LBC sheet headed ‘Important’, containing another prompt to read The Left News.
The Left News, No. 84 (June 1943). Edited by Victor Gollancz. 335 LEF
‘Please use this leaflet’ leaflets. Southampton: Camelot Press Ltd, 1938-39
‘Please use this leaflet’ leaflets. Southampton: Camelot Press Ltd, 1938-39
‘Please use this leaflet’ leaflets. Southampton: Camelot Press Ltd, 1938-39
‘Please use this leaflet’ leaflets. Southampton: Camelot Press Ltd, 1938-39
