I 100% agree about the different heights of the black spine logos its SO ANNOYING

I'm so happy that this video was in my KZfaq video recommendations! I'm excited to watch more of your videos 😊

This is the best, honest reviews I got from these editions. Thank you so much. Please keep doing more :)

thanks for your review. I appreciate your time spent going over all of these editions. Best regards. Mike

So glad I discovered your channel! I've just begun building a classics collection and was lost re the various editions. Thank you!

Thanks Kathi! I am collecting some of my favourite Austen books in hardcover, and your advice has been very helpful! Those Chiltern editions look amazing. I’d also never heard of Flame Tree, but will definitely check them out. Thanks again!

Hi Kathie. This classic podcast just popped up on my feed. I love the Chiltern Classic series. I saw them in QBD and fell in love with the covers. They’re so pretty. I agree with you about the garish cover on the Louisa May Alcott book you showed. I was given the Jane Austin one for a birthday gift and have given it to my daughter- it’s just too bright with its blue and gold. She likes it very much. Look forward to seeing you soon 💕

Really loved hearing you discuss classics and where you buy from. A great video.

What a delightful and informative video. I'm inspired to start my own classics collection now. 👍

Stumbling upon your channel today is one of the best serendipitous discoveries I've had in a while. This video was very informative and I loved it a lot. Watching it made me really happy! So thank you for that :)

Hello Madame! I'm discovering your channel with this video and I really love hearing you talking about books (+ as non native english speaker you're easily understandable which makes it even better!)

I am so happy I have stumbled across your channel Kathi! This was so informative, and so soothing. This might sound as an odd remark, but thank you so much for talking like a normal person, I'm so sick of booktubers always yelling and overexagerating their reactions and opinions, and you are a breath of fresh air!

Loved this video. Just what I needed. Thank you!

You have a wonderful collection of books, all different editions!

Chiltern has because a favorite of mine! I do enjoy those lovely covers! One-off my favorites was Jane Eyre and A Christmas Carol!

Good video. Some new publishers to me. I'm also in Australia. There are also the everyman's Classics range and Collins World's Classics. Both very good quality.

First I want to say I loved loved this video. I’ve heard you few times talk about how you buy the same books if you like a new addition book cover and I wondered why. It was nice to see your opinions in this. Second, the white line not aligning it must be the most frustrating thing in the world. 😂

Hello Kathi, very lovely and informative video! You may like the Everyman’s Library hardcover editions. I have 2 and they seem to be very good quality and look beautiful with and without their dust jackets! Hopefully they are available in Australia :)

This is the first of your videos I watch (Hi, nice to meet you!) and I was so pleased to see some loved showed by the Wordsworth Classics, the paperbacks I mean. They usually get lots of negative comments because of their covers but I quite like them and I even prefer them over Penguin Black Spines when I can find them.

Thank you for this tour of editions! As I near retirement, I have a few thousand dollars to spend replacing my bookshelves of nonfiction special interest books with classics and other fiction works. I bought one book each from several publishers to see which really inspired me. I have to admit, I’ve really fallen for the Folio Society (FS) books. I’ve also just ordered my fifth and sixth Easton Press (EP) editions. I can’t see having a library of Easton Press books, simply because they all look the same on the shelf. I know that’s the point for some people, but for me, I like a little of the personality of each book to show on the spine. There are two editions that you didn’t mention that I think you may like: the Everyman’s classics (EC) and Library of America (LoA). For my absolute favorites, I’ll spring for the FS or EP edition, but for the many others that I want to read eventually, EC is my go to for single volumes and LoA for complete collections of particular authors. You may or may not like the aesthetics of the dust jackets (particularly LoA); however, you can take the jackets off, if you want, and have very elegant, single tone clothbound covers that I think you might like the look of. The EC color code the cloth covers based on when they were written, which is also a nice touch. Another edition I’ll mention, though many of these are too colorful for your taste, I’m afraid, are the Wordcloud Classics (WC). They are flexible cloth covers and have a moderate amount of classic titles. They are very reasonably priced and look like they’ll hold up to repeated readings. Thanks again, for your video!

thank you for shaing your experience, beautiful video i have a few of these, especially from knickerbocker, barnes and noble, and Canterbury classics, you should check them too

New subscriber here, and also a lover of classics. I collect hardcovers and found this video very interesting and helpful!

Great video! I have 3 books (Dorian Gray, Moby Dick and Phantom of the Opera) in chartwell classics and though i agree that they stick out, i personally think that placing them all together on a separate shelf or placing them horizontal with decor on the sides seems to work. The biggest selling point for me was their size (😅) and flexibility.

Oh how I wish you were my neighbor! This was a wonderful video....just the information I tend to look for.

Best wishes with your reading. Can't beat the classics.

Great video! you should give the Oxford classics a try. They are paperback and along with Pengiuns they are some of my favorites. They are white instead of black and are very clean with covers that usually have nice illustrations.

This channel is so wholesome ☺

omg i have 4 of those Timeless Classics and I ADORE them. I'm mostly a fan of Everyman's Library editions because of the aesthetic.

Loved this video so much 😊

thank you for making this video it helps a lot

Thank you so much for this video!

Great video! The Penguin Clothbounds are frustrating, I have quite a few and some I don’t mind looking worn but some look pretty bad once quite worn out in my opinion, 1984 being one of them, my Iliad just looks a mess when it was so beautiful to begin with. Some have an indentation that stop them from smudging like Dracula which looks brand new and has been well read, despite my garlic hand sweat (maybe there’s a supernatural element at work!). In general though I love the aesthetic and Penguins additional notes and drawings can be extremely useful. I’ve started getting Everyman’s editions now, do you have them in Australia? The binding is sewn which should hopefully make them last a lifetime and I would the price is very reasonable in the UK for the quality.

Thank you for share your beautiful collection

Thank you I bought the Wordsworth of Little Women and I love it!!!

I just this morning discovered your channel and I like very much what I see. I enjoyed this video and certainly learned from it. I have started building a classics library and which editions to buy has become an issue. I rather like the Barnes & Nobel Classic Collectable editions. The Chartwell Classics are really excellent and inexpensive. As for paperbacks, I am certainly going to check out the Wordsworth paperback Classics. I hope the text doesn't run close into the spine - this is one of my big dislikes in many paperback.

Wonderful video! I’m currently collecting a few Easton Press and Folio Society books. I’d love to try a Knickerbocker book! Do you know where in the USA one could find them? A website seemed elusive upon searching. You have a new subscriber. 😊

I have to agree with you on the timeless classics hardcover books; even though I think the company is called rockpoint publishing here or they could be completely different companies I do not know for here in the U.S. however, the designs of the books look the same. I'm making my way through the,complete tales of H.P. Lovecraft Timeless classics edition, I've also was recently gifted the complete tales of sherlock Holmes in the timeless classics edition and they're both gorgeous! I have a mix of hard and soft cover books and manga on my shelf ; to me as long as the book is physical and the font is not too small, it'll be a book I'll dive into whole heartedly! 😊❤📚

New sub. I live in NZ and getting penguin editions from Australia. Thanks for your video.

Great video! This is super picky I realize but I hate it when a nice hardback edition has the UPC code permanently printed on the back.

you make some enjoyable videos .. btw, living in the US, I've amassed a collection of Easton books .,. mostly the great classics, here in the used book stores, sometimes you can pick them up for as little as $15 US... the more in demand ones for as much as $40..

I love the Pan Macmillan collection. The color on the spine is a sort of burnished bronze. They are pocket sized. I like how compact and cute they are. I buy my Eastons used. I can't afford new ones. I generally can find them in excellent shape. They are very, very nice.

Just wanted to say you look and sound like you could be Cate Blanchett's big sister/mom, I mean that as a compliment. It was a pleasure listening to you and seeing some of the books in your collection!

Great work. You may be interested in talking about Elizabeth Paradiso Urassa's books. They are very good for university students and may help the loved ones not to drop out of their studies. I appreciate what you are doing. Thank you very much.

I agree about Dymocks. I recently got something through them and they sent the wrong edition. As any other book collector will know, we often carefully choose the books we buy. It is of course about the book's content, but the cover - the art, graphics, font, etc - can influence the feel of the book, and we love books where the cover seems to reflect how we feel about the book. A lot of book collectors specifically collect books by the same author that have the same cover artist/design, or in limited edition series etc. Dymocks essentially said "it's the same" and it's whatever the warehouse has at the time. It's just poor advertising. Don't advertise a product you don't have, and if substituting is an option, contact the customer and ask if they are ok with a substitute. As a disabled/chronically ill person it was going to be too fiddly to hunt around for the original edition I'd actually ordered, order it somewhere else, send the other one back. So I opted for 15% off the book which of course is measly because their book prices are so high. I won't be buying from them again.

As someone who collects manga the only thing I can say about the spines not matching up is welcome to the pain game. I’ve actually had to go through manga volumes and double check which ones looked less like a disaster.

Kathi Ive purchased several Easton leatherbounds off ebay in the $45 US range plus shipping.

I love your bookshelf. It looks sturdy and heavy 😂

Great video, check out Everyman's library as well. Their covers are a little boring but the book quality is superb.

Those Chiltern books are perfection

I'm a big fan of Oxford World Classics myself for paperback. For hardback I go Everymans Library.

Excellent

Great video analyzing the different editions. I also have a similar video showing my classic collection while analyzing the editions. What do you think of the Everyman's library editions? I feel those are really good quality for a reasonable price.

Isn't the font size of the Clothbound Classics a bit too small? Doy you find it friendly for reading? Besides what you mention about the covers.

thank you for the penguin cloth heads-up - that's ridiculous for it to smudge like that

I went on a cruise iwth a friend ( we live in Texas, USA) around New Zealand to Australia and then stayed in Sydney 3 or so nights. we were walking around and found a bookstore and she had ot drag me out!

Cute pupper and catto.

does the wilco edition have notes and introduction?

I think you will like calla editions and Canterbury classics leather bound

Penguin classics are now a little expensive considering the hardback smyth sewn editions you can get for not much more, the introductions and notes in them are good though but don’t think they are as sturdy as they used to be.

What do you think of everyman’s library especially the childrens classics with gold and black checkered spine.

In the paperback, I like the Oxford.

I also think Everyman's Library has great minimal hardcovers

It's not just you. I cover similar books with wrapping paper so they all look same because the publishers can't be bothered to ensure parity 😭.

What about Folio Society books?

Wordsworth's font size challenges me on weekly basis.

I just picked up paperback Oxford World Classics edition of Agnes Grey and I find it unreadable. Small letters and too much text on a page. The super white coloured paper doesn't help either. Just picked up a vintage hardback copy from a second hand shop which is miles better.

Books not lining up, worst thing for me. Absolute luxury problem, but still. I have all the books of David Mitchell(not the comedian), some of them sadly in paperback, but the majority in the hardcover first editions from the same publisher. Every. single. one. different. different height, different width, so the spine sticks out, some dust covers are velvety-sticky, others are plain paper, then glossy.

Of the Timeless Classics, those are top notch and have become collectibles thus their price in the market is going up quickly. Pity, their selection is very small; otherwise I would buy anything they print. B&N would be the best choice as for value for money and their selection. Nowadays, they print 1-2 books a year. Penguin cloth bound classics are a tragedy and a rip off. Most of the copies I have examined in shops have that smudging defect.

Try placing a coin or two ‘neath the bottoms of those lower banded books. It’s got to be cheaper than an anxiety drug prescription.

That book that smudged and wore off... I have zero qualms about returning poor quality books. Or books damaged by shipping. (I never buy from Amazon for that reason.) Send that Penguin Clothbound back.

My decision is primarilly based o the translator.

great video Kathi. couldn't agree more about the penguin clothbound classics. i read the Count of Monty Cristo recently in that addition. Its a long and hefty book and when i was done with it i had completely destroyed the design on it. Really disappointing. Wont be buying anymore.

Why have you not posted in four months?