The Princess Aline by Richard Harding Davis - poster
The pattern
This still is filed under Lettered cover hook.
Define
The cover is the hook, and the hook is lettering: a title treated as an image.
Mechanism
Type as bait. The words are drawn so they stop the hand before the contents are known.
Verdict
A journal, book, or issue must sell itself on a rack or a feed
Why it works
The picture is the argument and the type is only the caption. Gibson sells the book by drawing its heroine rather than describing her, so the buyer projects the whole story onto one face before reading a word. The vertical stack is a strict hierarchy of borrowed authority: character first, author second, artist third as a signature rather than typeset text, publisher last. Printing the illustrator's credit as a facsimile autograph turns a credit line into a maker's mark, which is why the poster works as a Gibson object as much as a Davis one.
Steal this when
Use this when the product has a single human protagonist a known artist or photographer can render, and the creator's name is itself a reason to buy. The layout is right whenever you want the audience to meet the character before they meet the pitch.