The literary market is thriving again: according to Nielsen Bookscan, sales in 2018 grew about 5% over the previously year. Writing a book and publishing it has never been so easy – just look at the Amazon Kindle self-publishing platform. But who are the new literature pop-stars? Contrary to what we had imagined, they are not the great classics, with timeless stories and unique narratives. The current best-sellers list is full of erotic romances with appealing covers, an easy target to the average reader. Our objective was to entice a reevaluation of people’s relationship with literature, bringing great works back into the spotlight, while working with a budget of virtually zero dollars. Because of that, we needed a strategy that would be thought-provoking and extremely cost-effective.

We were always told not to judge a book by its cover. But, as the best-sellers on the Kindle Store show, covers with bare-chested, muscular men tend to get more sales. If people were in fact picking their books by the cover, we had to play the same game if we wanted to make the classics more appealing. Back in the day, the authors of the great classics did not have access to the same tools as contemporary authors do to turn their books into a hit. So we decided to make this fairer. We chose remarkable classics of the literature, remade their covers and titles so they could compete on the same level.

The new covers are tributes to the most decadent, appealing erotic novel covers out there. We looked at dozens of covers to find the most common features: strong male upper body, very defined muscles, usually no face in frame, a very striking, heavy font with a powerful word – in our case, shamelessly derived from the original book titles. But we did not change a single word from the actual book: they are still the same great pieces of work they have always been. The result is, to say the least, eye-grabbing, and stands out immensely from the other covers for the same titles.

The Judgeable Covers collection blew past its initial goals: with no budget at all, the new covers caught the attention of the media and brought these classic books back to the spotlight. The editions remained among the top best sellers for three consecutive weeks and sold nearly 300% more than before the change in covers. The sarcastic tone of the collection made the books popular gifts in Brazil, and were featured in some of the country’s biggest newspapers, such as Folha de S. Paulo, Estadao and O Globo.