The New York Trilogy is a post-modern work of fiction. The three novels employ and deconstruct a detective story, which reverses in the function and meaning of the language.

The three set novel deals with many themes, but identity seems to be the most apparent out of all of them and so I decided to go with this route. Within the novels Auster actually tries to explore his inner self by means of writing. By creating the characters he has made in the three novels he inhabits each one, although only really resembles or shares a certain attribute to himself.

Each of his characters deals with the theme of identity, but in slightly different manners. Some are presenting mistaken identity, whereas others acquire a double. Although no matter which character, they all try to establish meaning in their life through the means of writing.

The stories deal with unsolved cases, disappearance and puzzles. By working within the pages of the book I experimented with different methods as to how I could adapt this and work with the idea of hidden identity. Through adaptation of the words I worked through a process of elimination to distort, highlight and block out different aspects of identity. The idea of hand written letters really held a high appeal to me in the respect of using a pen on paper revealing aspects to people’s personalities depending on what they write.

Through the process of elimination the viewer is lead to confusion as to why aspects have been removed or highlighted, meaning these are the main focus out of the whole page. This was the main focus within my method of working.

As a final piece I did not want the pages of the book alone to become the main illustration due to the fact that they do not lend themselves as a front cover. Through the selection of type I began to acknowledge the ‘hidden identity’ within the novel again. By selecting the font to sit largely on the page allowed the negative space to speak loudly against the busy inner fill. For me this shows how, just like the characters, although you are engulfed in a large surrounding, a person may feel lost and alone. The arranging of the type suggests a tall, daunting surrounding which reflects in the location used within the book. By using a silhouette type with the filled inside illustrating the pages I worked on within the book shows an aspect of bringing the inside out. For many of Austers characters they went through a process of learning how to do this by different forms of identity, although not one of his characters completely showed their true self. By the means of using the silhouette I am able to block off parts of the pages, allowing only a limited amount to show to the viewer.