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As far as I know, there have been three major publishers of Ann Petry's novel, The Street. Each one used a different cover image to sell the novel to readers. The most common publisher has used three different cover illustrations, in the 1940s, 1990s and now in the 2000s. Each of these cover illustrations sends different messages to the reader about the contents of the book.
The 1946 cover focuses
on Lutie's face, almost like a fashion magazine cover. There's
no indication of poverty or misery, just a beautiful woman's face.
Of course, once the reader opened the book and saw the title
page illustration, they would get a better idea of the content,
but the cover showed no indication of the despair inside the novel.
In fact, as you should be able to tell by the larger cover shown
here, Lutie's face is only half on the cover, with the other half
on the spine. Thus, the publisher almost seems to be crowding
Lutie off of the cover of the book, or is it symbolic of Lutie's
inability to fit into her society?
Petry had been awarded a $2,400 fellowship by the publisher in order to write the novel, as they clearly indicate on the cover. However generic the cover may seem to us today, it worked at the time, making The Street a best-seller.
For a novel with a title like The Street, there's little to no indication here of where that street might be. There's no indication that this novel is set in Harlem. In fact, given the time period, this cover illustration, combined with the title, could very well have implied that it was the story of a prostitute. Anything for sales, huh?
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