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In The Romantic Englishwoman, Thomas is buying some books. He is trying to pick The Godfather Novel by Mario Puzo. It has Marlon Brando's face. I already checked it's cover in google images before posting it here and none showed the cover with Marlon Brando's face.

enter image description here

Why does the cover of The Godfather novel have Marlon Brando's face?

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    There are several editions of the book. I'm assuming that the first editions don't show his face and that it had his face on the cover only after the movie since Marlon Brando portrays the lead character (The Godfather) in the film. – steelersquirrel May 19 '17 at 7:36
  • I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because this is about coverpage of novel, not the movie – Panther May 19 '17 at 7:38
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    @Panther But it is from scene from a movie. – The Hawk May 19 '17 at 7:39
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    @Panther, OP asks for an explanation about a movie prop. – Silver Bebs May 19 '17 at 7:45
  • Sorry my mistake retracting vote. I missunderstood the question. – Panther May 19 '17 at 8:25
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Marlon Brando is the main character of the movie The Godfather which is an adaptation of the novel.

I could find a similar edition on ebay or amazon.

enter image description here

This is an edition published by Pan Books in 1971, ISBN: 0330024574.

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    Interesting that the date for this edition is a year before the release of the movie. I guess cross-promotion was a think even back in the '70s. – Michael Seifert May 19 '17 at 18:48
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This is true of many books that become adapted into wildly popular movies or movie series. Often there is movie-popularity-driven interest in the books, so on subsequent printings, publishers bow to or try to attract that kind of interest by using imagery that comes from the adaptations.

First edition Godfather cover:

Original Godfather cover (image did not upload)

Later editions:

Movie characters on later Godfather book cover

Harry Potter cover artwork also noticeably changed to resemble Daniel Ratcliffe more after the movies were made.

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