In This Sign

About In This Sign

The bestselling modern classic by the author of I Never Promised You a Rose Garden about a deaf couple, their hearing child, and the bond they create through sign language, featuring a new introduction by Sara Nović, author of the New York Times bestseller True Biz, and a new afterword by the author

“Astute and wholly authentic . . . This novel isn’t only one of deaf hardship, but also one of bravery and great joy. . . . Over the course of it, I was often as gripped . . . as I am while reading a thriller.” —Sara Nović, from the Introduction

A Penguin Classic

Abel and Janice meet at a school for the deaf. Sign language brings them together, enabling them to survive and, indeed, to forge a love too powerful to be broken by the world into which they were born. Spanning forty years, from the late 1920s to the early 1960s, In This Sign follows the lives of Abel, Janice, and their hearing daughter, Margaret, as they contend uneasily with the “Outside”—a world designed, often purposely, to be inhospitable to those like them.

First published in 1970, only a decade after ASL’s formal recognition as a language and well before the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act, In This Sign stands out as a rare, compassionate portrait of the deaf community.

For more than seventy-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 2,000 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.