Read any good books lately as an ice breaker is passé. Saw any good book covers is the question that’s now being asked. Suddenly, as books change into something that will be seen more often on your computer screen than in your hands in the not-so-distant future, artists and publishers are celebrating a part of the book that may well lose its importance in the years to come — its cover.

Not surprisingly, a recent exhibition on book covers — The Art of the Book — held at Seagull Arts and Media Resource Centre in Calcutta evoked nostalgia from all quarters. Sunandini Banerjee, senior editor and graphic designer, had created digital collages out of covers, merging them with images and extracts from books published by Seagull. Not many who saw the pictures framed on the wall believed in the adage that books shouldn’t be judged by their covers. A good book, the experts argued, often had a good cover.

That’s why Shruti Debi, editor, Picador India, still recalls the jacket of Ulysses, while writer Amit Chaudhuri loves the “simplicity and concentration” of European covers. “They use just one or two colours, and they keep the design stark and minimal. A cover could have a white background, with writing in simple black,” he says. American covers have a “jagged and rough” look which, he says, seeks to give an impression that it is hand crafted.

Like plots, covers can evoke strong arguments and passions. Dan Brown’s book The Lost Symbol kicked up a furore before its release last year, with readers arguing over clues to the book’s plot that the cover was believed to carry. The jacket of Justine Larbalestier’s 2009 book Liar, which showed a white-skinned face when the story was about a black girl, had to be changed amid allegations of racial stereotypes. Critics said the girl’s race was changed to increase sales.

Clearly, book covers tell their own story. Publishers Penguin have brought out Penguin 75, a compilation of some of the best book covers in its 75 years of existence which had both authors and designers talking about books. Faber & Faber too released a book celebrating 80 years of its covers last year. In Penguin 75, many authors happily admitted that the covers sold their books.

That’s not surprising, for book covers have had their share of stars. Filmmaker Satyajit Ray, who was in advertising when he took to cinema, designed many covers, including Bibhuti Bhushan Bandopadhyaya’s Aam Atir Bhepu — the book that led to Pather Panchali. Director Purnendu Patri was also a well-known designer of covers.

Photographer Sanjeev Saith recalls the making of the cover of The God of Small Things. Arundhati Roy wanted an image of water — and the team went to Kerala, where the book is set, searching for the perfect picture. Finally, they ended up using a photograph — pink water lilies in a grey pool — that Saith had shot at the India International Centre in Delhi as a sample illustration before they began their search.

These days, technology has brought about changes and covers are often a mix of photographs and graphic designs. “The computer makes it possible for me to do anything I want,” says Banerjee, who says she cannot draw. “We can no longer do away with computer interference. Even if you use a painting, it has to go under a scanner.” Technology speeds the process, but it’s not without its downside. “There is a danger now of working with many concepts; that becomes a huge effort and more time consuming,” says Shuka Jain, art director, HarperCollins.

Do writers have a say on covers? Comic book artist Chris Ware says in his foreword to Penguin 75 that not all authors are visual. Most of them like to leave the reins to the designer. But there are others who take a keen interest in the covers. John Updike, Ware adds, used to say that he could not begin writing a book till he “first imagined its spine.”

Chaudhuri does not think of the cover while writing. But he did go walking down St Cyril Road in Mumbai with photographer Nitesh Mohanty for the cover of St Cyril Road and Other Poems, and it was he who suggested a photograph shot by Achinto Ghosh be used on the cover of Memory’s Gold. In Chaudhuri’s novel A Strange and Sublime Address the designer used a photograph by Raghubir Singh of a palace in Udaipur. Though the story was set in Calcutta, the picture clicked.

While there are instances of books being picked up by their covers, publishers often change the jacket when a book becomes a bestseller or is turned into a hit film. Kunal Basu’s The Japanese Wife, which was filmed by Aparna Sen, got a cover inspired by the celluloid release, as did Vikas Swarup’s Q&A, better known today as the book that inspired Slumdog Millionaire. “Q&A sold like anything when it was re-jacketed,” says a spokesperson of Oxford Bookstore.

Last year, Seagull came out with new editions of a series of Mahasweta Devi’s books, with paintings by Arunima Chowdhury. Picador will launch a revised edition of Aravind Adiga’s Between the Assassinations next month. Debi says changes are made to covers to “update a look” as tastes change. Sometimes, it’s done to accommodate an important piece of news, such as the book or the author winning a coveted prize, she says.

What resonates can click in minutes or “take months” to materialise, Jain points out. “But one cannot go mad with creativity,” admits Pinaki De, a freelance designer with major publishing houses. There are no strict dos and don’ts on covers, but some stick to a few basic rules. Writer Janice Y.K. Lee, for instance, writes in Penguin 75 that “Covers should not have a character’s face (it should be left to the reader’s imagination).”

Clearly, there is no formula on what works. But, as Chaudhuri stresses, “A good cover is one where you are not thinking about the buyer and the market, but of what works best with the text and which resonates the title.”

What about the future of the cover in the age of ebooks? Will it become obsolete, like a record sleeve that is still a talking point long after it’s been eased out? More than 40 years after The Beatles launched Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and Abbey Road, people still moon over their music — and their album covers. Few, however, would remember covers of CDs, which have replaced records.

Likewise, says Debi, book covers will become obsolete only when the physical book bows out. “A beautiful cover adds to the experience of reading. In the case of ebooks, the reader will miss out on this experience.”

But that’s not likely to happen soon, right? The Picador editor laughs. “You never know,” she says.