As we’re all celebrating the 50th anniversary of the movie Jaws, here’s something I bet you didn’t know: Due to a fluke of publishing and copyright law, the Jaws shark is public domain.
It’s not the character of the shark that’s public domain – or someone would surely be making a low-budget horror prequel about how he became the Amity Island Killer. But I’m talking about the famous shark painting from the movie poster:
Yep. That painting, the same one that appeared on the cover of the paperback edition of the novel, is public domain.
This is kind of a wild story.
When the book first came out, it didn’t have this cover art. An old New York Times article about the book’s origin explains that the author, Peter Benchley, actually had his own idea for the cover. He thought it should show “a peaceful unsuspecting town through the bleached jaws of a shark.” He pitched his idea to Doubleday, who was publishing the hardcover version of the book.
So Doubleday senior editor Tom Congdon worked with art director Alex Gotfryd and had an artist produce this mock-up:
Art by Wendell Minor
Congdon didn’t like it. He said, “the shark’s bones look too liplike and pendulous.” A preview of the cover was shown at a book sales manager’s conference, and there was “considerable resistance” from the salesmen who said it resembled a vagina with teeth.
The book was supposed to come out in January, 1974, but publication was delayed until February to rework the cover.
Congdon asked, “Can we have just a fish on the cover?”
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