January 25, 2003
An Unfortunate Ambiguity

Virginia Postrel reports (1/23) that her publisher has raised last minute objections to the title of her forthcoming book:

TITLE TK: Now the marketing powers that be have decided that Look and Feel isn't a good enough title (at least they like the contents!). So it's back to the title factory for my book . . . .

I wonder whether the publisher's objection has something to do with good taste. After all, Look and Feel could easily be misunderstood as if the two nouns were imperative verbs. If I were publishing a book with a dust jacket photo that looked like this, I wouldn't want to give it a title that could be misconstrued as if it meant Stare and Fondle:

Posted by Dr. Weevil at January 25, 2003 10:20 AM
Comments

I'd think such a double entendre could only help sales, myself...

Posted by: Dean Esmay on January 26, 2003 06:56 AM

"Eye and vagina". That's the first thing I thought when I saw the proposed cover.

Glad to see I wasn't alone in this.

Posted by: dipnut on January 27, 2003 04:58 PM