LONDON - Book publisher Penguin is overhauling its Classics titles to bolster their appeal to contemporary audiences.

Creative agency Figtree has been briefed to reposition the Penguin Classics range to make it accessible to younger readers.

The agency has already created an ad campaign for novelist Peter Ackroyd's retelling of Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales. The work is aimed at giving  the book a ‘fresh and fun' feel to persuade people to consider the relevance of classic titles as a whole.

The ‘raunchy' campaign takes a ‘road trip' theme, describing The Canterbury Tales as a 60-mile pilgrimage from London to Canterbury. The strapline reads: ‘28 people, 25 stories, 60 miles, lots and lots of banter, booze and bawdiness. The Canterbury Tales, retold for our time.'

Ads will be rolled out later this month in the national press, including The Times, The Guardian and Daily Telegraph.

Penguin Press marketing manager Natalie Ramm said the publisher wants to refresh its communications approach.

The repositioning of the Penguin Classics brand follows Oxford University Press' decision to rebrand the 700-plus titles in its Oxford World Classics range. It redesigned the books' covers to give them a ‘fresh, clean and inviting' look intended to appeal to a wider range of readers.