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The first novel by Frances Burney, Evelina, Or, the History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World, published in 1778, has enjoyed long-standing popularity and has never gone out of print in English. A distinct cluster of its editions appeared at the end of the nineteenth- to the beginning of the twentieth-century. This period in book history was marked by the creative work of private-press book designers, printers, binders, and illustrators inspired by the aestheticism, arts and crafts, and art nouveau movements. Even though their pioneering work was destined for narrow circles of collectors and connoisseurs, it profoundly influenced the development of both industrial and artists' book design, heightening the awareness of books' aesthetic appeal. The fin de siècle was a time of nostalgia for idealized pre-industrial society, symptomatic of late Victorian and Edwardian escapism, which found its expression in lavish book ornaments and illustrations executed in the Directoire and Louis XVI styles. Late nineteenth- to early twentieth-century Evelinas, illustrated and decorated by Aubrey Beardsley, Arthur Rackham, and Hugh Thomson, produced by Dent, Newnes, and Macmillan, reflect a profound influence that innovative private presses had on general publishing practices and the quality of industrially produced books. These Evelinas, beautifully illustrated, bound in decorative covers, and well-printed, exemplify both the newly awakened interest in the book's physical makeup and aesthetic aspects and the late-Victorian and Edwardian escapist nostalgia characteristic of fin de siècle publishing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A translation of a book is not just a faithful conversion of its text from one language to another. The translation is a regeneration of the entire complex organism of the book which often radically alters its paratextual apparatus. Thomas Piketty's Capital in the Twenty-First Century (Harvard University Press, 2014) is a book that has not only challenged the current capitalist economic model but has also revolutionized the idea of a bestseller. A comparison of the paratexts of its French and English editions demonstrates how a skilful and purposeful visual repackaging of a book, deploying a different paratext, without any cuts or alterations to its text, can radically transform it, make the translation attractive to a wider audience, and ultimately be a contributing factor in its success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]