Grove Koger
In my post for November 11, 2018, I discussed Tauchnitz Editions—a series of paperback books aimed at English-speaking travelers but distributed outside the British Empire and the United States. Tauchnitz had this rather specialized market to itself for nearly a century, but in the early 1930s a new firm, the Albatross Modern Continental Library, overtook the older firm in sales.
Founded in 1932 in Hamburg, Albatross followed the same distribution model—“not to be introduced into the British Empire or the U.S.A.”—but modernized its books in terms of size, design and typeface. Whereas Tauchnitz Editions were uninspiringly squat, Albatrosses were taller, approximating the pleasing golden ratio of 1.618. Unlike its predecessor, Albatross bound its books in brightly colored covers according to genre. Thanks to this innovation, potential buyers at a busy train station could quickly pick out a volume of short stories (orange), a book of travel (green), or a mystery (red). The books’ typography was more elegant, and the simple, evocative image of the far-ranging albatross that appeared on their covers surely appealed, perhaps subconsciously, to those who thought of themselves as cosmopolites.
Then too, at a time when Tauchnitz championed what were once called middlebrow books, Albatross signed contracts with forward-looking writers, many of them modernists who still rank high in the pantheon of twentieth-century authors. Joyce’s collection Dubliners actually appeared as Volume 1 of the Albatross Modern Continental Library in 1932, and the company even published an edition of his controversial novel Ulysses the same year, although for safety’s sake it appeared under the imprint of the Odyssey Press.
Albatross’s attractive line caught on so quickly that the firm actually bought Tauchnitz in 1934, although the older line remained in production—eventually fitful production—until the mid-1950s.
As war approached, Albatross forged partnerships with other publishers in Europe and even the United States. And, very occasionally, it produced books in different formats. I own a soiled 1947 hardbound, dust-jacketed Albatross copy of Frederic Prokosch’s first book, The Asiatics, published in partnership with the Norwegian firm of H. Aschehoug & Co. Although it’s a novel, its theme of travel earned it a green cover.
Like Tauchnitz Editions, the Albatross Library ceased publication during the mid-1950s, but I ran into used copies of its books frequently in Europe in the 1970s. They made unusual souvenirs, and even now are readily available through online dealers.
If you’d like to know more about the Albatross Modern Continental Library, see paperbackrevolution.wordpress.com/albatross/ and Strange Bird: The Albatross Press and the Third Reich by Michele K. Troy (Yale University Press, 2017).
World Enough 