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The golden ass / Lucius Apuleius. Hardmondsworth: Penguin, 1950
“One notable masterpiece from the series of Penguin Classics is Tschichold's book design for The Transformations of Lucius, otherwise known as The Golden Ass, written by Lucius Apuleius, translated by the poet and novelist Robert Graves. First published as a softback in 1950, Penguin issued their own hardback version, a 298-page, 2000 limited deluxe edition the following year. The books' detail included a beige cloth, gilted stamped lettering on a vellum spine, vellum tips, (also referred to as French corners), and finisheing by hand to reinforce the spine and binding in order to avoid damage while handling. For the lettering of the spine, The Golden Ass, Tschichold creates by hand drawn cursive lettering in a decorative and graceful script with vitality and harmony. Two rules of different weights had been added for visual support within the spine. The book was protected with a tan dustwrapper and fitted inside the original two-color card slipcase. Tschichold set the two-color card slipcase in all caps, monotype Perpetua in three distinctive groupings of typography. What made this design unique was the harmony and extreme clarity achieved by Tschichold's exquisitely centered arrangements, agreeable groupings, and elegant relationships of typography.”
Richard B. Doubleday. Jan Tschichold designer: the Penguin years. New Castle: Oak Knoll; Aldershot: Lund Humphries, 2006 (p. 80)