New Release: Piranesi from The Folio Society

Interview with The Folio Society, Susanna Clarke, and Julian De Narvaez

Last year, we interviewed The Folio Society for their highly anticipated release of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. This year, they are releasing an incredible edition of another brilliant novel from Susanna Clarke, Piranesi. This was one of my favorite novels from the last few years and I am extremely excited to take a look at what The Folio Society is putting together for this incredibly unique and captivating story. We were fortunate enough to also get contributions from Susanna Clarke and Julian De Narvaez on this project as well, getting a sneak peek at every aspect of this wonderful production. Expected Release Date: May 6th

The Folio Society Team

Q: It is so exciting that after the release of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell, you are following it up with another brilliant Susanne Clarke book, Piranesi. Coming after a long hiatus from getting new work from Clarke, it came out of nowhere and really blew people away. Was this project already in progress before the release of Jonathan Strange, or did it come as a new idea based on the success of that book? Can you walk us through the process of discovering this title and deciding to publish it through the Folio Society? 

With the success of the Folio edition of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, it's clear that Susanna Clarke has a devoted fanbase, and there continues to be a strong appetite among our customer base for genre fiction. With that in mind, it made sense to publish a Folio edition of Piranesi, a novel that is arguably as popular as Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. Piranesi is set in a different universe from Clarke's other books, but it is in many ways a more accessible choice for the fact that it is a slim volume and a stand-alone story. It was a bestseller in the US and the UK, and it won the prestigious Women's Prize for Fiction. As well as winning this major literary award, Piranesi was shortlisted for the Nebula and the Hugo awards, which is a testament to the book's crossover appeal.

Q: While Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell was challenging due to the size and complexity, Piranesi is very concise in comparison. Are there any unique challenges you faced during the production or design phase of this book, and how does your approach differ when you have a lot less to work with in terms of the text?

The editor was always keen on a small format for this one and for it to feel quite different to Jonathan Strange as it is a very different story. We used unique typesetting to show that the story is told via extracts of journal entries as well.

Q: While this is not one of your higher-end limited editions, there are some unique and wonderful touches to this piece, like the cutout on the slipcase. How do you determine when certain books will get the limited treatment and what features will be part of a particular production like this one?

All Folio books are special! We will also have 100 copies that will be signed by Susanna Clarke.

The cover artwork and the way the faun is positioned on the front board gave the opportunity for a large shape to be cut out of the slipcase and for the artwork to show through. A head shape seemed appropriate for the mental turmoil Piranesi experiences. The gold blocked birds link the slipcase to the book cover.

Illustrator – Julian De Narvaez

Q: What was your relationship with Piranesi before being offered to do the illustrations by Folio Society? Were you familiar with the story, and if not, what did you do to prepare for illustrating this edition of it?

When I accepted the project, I immersed myself in the novel, taking detailed notes on its atmosphere, themes, and the protagonist’s unique perception of the world. To prepare for the illustrations, I researched architectural elements reminiscent of the novel’s vast, mysterious space and studied classical engravings, including those of Giovanni Battista Piranesi, and also explored ways to visually capture the novel’s sense of solitude, wonder, and timelessness. My goal was to translate the book’s intricate and dreamlike world into evocative images that enhance the reading experience.

Q: I first became aware of your work through your contribution to the release of Slaughterhouse Five with Suntup Editions, which was beautifully done. From observing your art more generally now, you have this ability to blend styles that create illustrations that can somehow be whimsical and ominous at the same time, which is why when I heard you were named as illustrator, I thought it was such a great fit. What were some of the primary emotions you were trying to capture in these illustrations and what techniques do you use to achieve that?

There is a sense of silence in the spaces Piranesi wanders through, where you can almost hear echoes fading into the distance. This was something I wanted to capture in the illustrations, which is why I focused on making the space and atmosphere the true protagonists of the image, rather than the characters themselves, who appear barely distinguishable amidst the interplay of light and the sculptures that populate these vast settings.

These sculptures, spanning different artistic periods, reinforce the feeling of mystery and timelessness. That contrast—one that raises more questions than it answers—was essential in shaping the book’s psychological atmosphere.

Q: In this story, the setting or “the House” is arguably a main character that is much more important to the story than simply a backdrop for the narrative to take place in. When you started envisioning how you would depict the setting, what were some of the most important aspects of capturing the unknown and mystery of the House through your illustrations? With the setting having a sense of repetitiveness throughout the story, how did you set to distinguish differences throughout the different parts of the House?

Absolutely, the House feels like a living entity, shaping the story just as much as any character. 

As I was defining the graphic tone of the book and distributing the number of illustrations, I realized that the text is written in such a visual way that my role was to channel that sense of journey into images. I found that the sculptures would serve as a key bridge to depict these scenes. I didn’t want to explain the space or define it completely—I wanted to suggest its vastness, inhabited by stone structures and disconnected sculptures, without taking away the reader’s opportunity to create it for themselves.

My approach was to hint at objects through shadow, allowing the reader to complete Piranesi’s world in their own mind. Achieving this effect and tone was one of the biggest challenges of the project. I had to change my usual methodology, as I typically begin by sketching characters and architecture with pencil outlines. But for this project, I chose to sketch directly with silhouettes, focusing on how light would define the objects. This shift was a graphic challenge that made the project even more exciting for me and expanded the way I think about my visual work.

On the tone and atmosphere of the illustrations, I wanted to emphasize vastness, grandeur, and mystery of the House, while also making it feel intimate and deeply personal, as it is to Piranesi. To capture the unknown and the House’s enigmatic nature, I focused on light, scale, anid atmosphere. I used vast, open spaces to create a sense of infinity, with towering statues and endless corridors that suggest something ancient and beyond human comprehension. At the same time, I contrasted this with moments of quiet intimacy – for example, the illustration in which Piranesi’s figure can be seen in the distance, fishing atop a stone bridge.

The challenge of depicting the repetitiveness of the House while maintaining visual variety pushed me to focus on subtle changes. I played with perspective shifts, different levels of the labyrinth, and atmospheric elements like mist, water, and shifting light to create a sense of movement and transformation. Even though the House is unchanging in many ways, Piranesi’s perception of it evolves, and I wanted the illustrations to reflect that journey.

Q: I’m sure that each one of the illustrations from this project are special to you as the illustrator, but is there one that you will look back on as particularly representative of your work and that you would include in a portfolio of your broader work?

It is difficult to choose a particular illustration, as each one plays an essential role within the visual narrative and reflects a specific emotional state that only fully makes sense when viewed as a whole. This project immersed me in a deep psychological atmosphere for several months, during which I almost felt like Piranesi himself, drawing and exploring spaces that oscillate between the real and the imaginary, between light and shadow.

The text is so beautifully written and creates such a vivid atmosphere that, as an artist, it was a pleasure to select and illustrate such surreal and subtle scenes. Now that I think about it, the final illustration of the book, where the characters fade into the mist within an illuminated space, represents the perfect conclusion to the project from a graphic perspective. But on a personal level, it also allowed me to symbolically close a cycle that, in turn, opened new artistic possibilities and paths. The symbolic presence of light in this scene becomes even more meaningful after having traversed illustrations marked by shadows and mystery. However, for this image to have the strength it does, all the previous illustrations are necessary, as they build the journey toward that final moment and give it its symbolic power.

In reality, I enjoyed creating all of the illustrations. For example, the scene where Piranesi observes the chess game played by two monumental stone kings lost in time was a particularly beautiful one to illustrate. It reinforced the atmospheric quality, the interplay of light and shadow, and the vast sense of space—almost as if the viewer must search for the character, lost within the monumental setting, sitting on a stone illuminated by a single ray of light. This is a project where I can truly say that I loved working on each and every illustration.

Author - Susanna Clarke

Q: Piranesi has such a distinct and atmospheric world. What were the key inspirations behind the labyrinthine House and its peculiar nature? Were you influenced by real-world places or works of art when creating it?

Piranesi has a lot of literary ancestors. The most obvious inspiration is the short fiction of Jorge Luis Borges, who created unique worlds in jewel-like fiction. In one story, the entire world is a library; another story explores the labyrinth of the Minotaur. Another inspiration would be two of the worlds which are visited by the children in C.S. Lewis's The Magician's Nephew. One is a wood and any visitor to the wood instantly forgets who they are, but also is immediately overcome by a sense of peace and contentment. The second is a vast, empty and decaying palace in the city of Charn. Lewis intended Charn to be threatening and depressing, but I always liked it. These sorts of worlds are quite surreal but they also have a strange kind of clarity to them which I find soothing.

I'm afraid there aren't many real-life models for Piranesi's House, though Chatsworth House in Derbyshire has a sculpture gallery which is a bit reminiscent of one of the Halls. There's only one statue in Piranesi's House which exists in the real world. It's the Gorilla, but I don't know where it is, other than that it’s in a garden somewhere.

Q: In Piranesi you explore themes of isolation, memory, and the impact of solitude on the human mind. What drew you to these themes, and how do you see Piranesi's relationship with the House evolving over time? How did you conceptualize memory as a narrative device, especially in relation to the protagonist's fragmented sense of identity?

I'm not so much drawn to themes, as much as I am to a picture in my head. In this case, my imagination was haunted by the idea of a vast, empty house, so vast that it contained oceans, and of two characters who met there and what they made of it. The themes emerge organically out of the story. After a long illness, I knew a bit about isolation, both its gifts and its terrors.

Memory has this strange property of being self-healing. By which I mean that any cracks in it tend to get smoothed over and become invisible. It's also the story we tell ourselves of who we are – and our memories could be (largely) right or they could be off by some distance. But even if the story we've told ourselves doesn't match what actually happened, it's still quite informative – it tells us who we want to be, or maybe what we're afraid of confronting in ourselves.

The theme I was most interested in was Piranesi's identification with the House, with something larger than himself. In this way, his solitariness was often subsumed in an overwhelming sense of connection to the world he found himself in. This was a difficult thing to convey.

Q: Many readers interpret the House (the primary setting of the story) in different ways--some see it as a metaphor for the mind, others as a representation of knowledge or memory. Is there a particular view on the House that you had going into it, or would you prefer to leave it open to interpretation? What emotions or ideas did you want readers to walk away with after finishing the book?

I think most writers are happy for readers to interpret their story – and that's particularly true of a book like Piranesi, which contains so much symbolism in the form of the statues which I deliberately left open to interpretation. They’re like dream imagery or the tarot.

It's very interesting to be asked what emotions I wanted there to be at the end of the book. I don't think anyone's ever asked me that before. I don't want to be too specific. The nearest I can get to it is a sense of wonder, a sense that the world is both beautiful and intensely alive. Not just a backdrop. I don't know whether I achieved it or not.

Q: What does it mean to you that people not only want to read your stories, but love them so much that they want to experience them, packed in such a beautiful way through the limited editions Folio Society has done?

I'm slightly astonished at readers' passion for truly beautiful books. Astonished and delighted and grateful. I've always loved illustrations in books. My favourite job was when I worked at a publisher that did amazing illustrated books, even when it wasn't very fashionable. The illustrations in the Folio Society's edition of Piranesi make my heart sing.

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This interview was done in a series of communications back and forth and we want to thank the entire team at Folio Society, Julian De Narvaez and Susanna Clarke for their contributions to this preview. If you want to keep up with the latest from Folio then you can check them out on their website to see some of their past and current productions. You can also follow them on Facebook or Instagram to stay up with all the incredible seasonal releases and limited editions. If you want to see some of Julian's past work and keep up with what he is currently working on, check him out on Instagram.

Interview by: Zach Harney a co-founder of the Collectible Book Vault

*Since there are often different spellings in American English and British English of the same words, we have chosen to adhere to the spelling of the person who is speaking rather than conform to one convention for the whole interview.