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Would you recognize classic literature if you saw it?

Suppose your language arts teacher hands out copies of Gulliver’s Travels, announcing that your class will be reading the novel together. If you’re not familiar with the title, you may not know when the book was written or what kind of story it holds. However, there are many clues that can help you classify Gulliver’s Travels right away--you’ll see most of these signs just by glancing at different parts of the book.

Click each of the images below to take a closer look at pages from Gulliver’s Travels. Are the images different than what you might see in books considered young adult literature? After studying each image, read the caption beneath it to learn some strategies for identifying classic literature.

Gullivers Travels Cover
Gullivers Travels Cover

Even if you have a much newer copy of the novel, its cover is likely to suggest the time when the story is set. If the characters are dressed in “outdated” clothes or if you see objects that seem to belong to the past, you’ve found one sign that the novel might be a classic.

Gullivers Travels Map
Gullivers Travels Map

This map is a very simple hand drawing that would have been easy to print on the earliest printing presses. The simplicity of visual aids like this could be a clue that you’re holding a classic.

Gullivers Travels Illustration
Gullivers Travels Illustration

The style of this illustration looks very different from the pictures you see in most of the novels published today—unless the publisher is going for a “vintage” look. Illustrations like these are another sign that a book may be old enough to be a classic.

/Gullivers Travels TOC
/Gullivers Travels TOC

Novels published today don’t always include a table of contents listing the chapters. When they do, the list is much simpler than this one. Long ago, publishers often provided a short description of each chapter after the chapter title or number.

Question

How have the visual elements of novels changed over the years?