Paul Bacon, the influential designer known for creating radical, eye-catching book jackets for major literary works like Joseph Heller’s “Catch-22” and Philip Roth’s “Portnoy’s Complaint,” died on Monday in Fishkill, N.Y. He was 91.

The cause was a stroke, his son, Preston, said. He added that Mr. Bacon, who had been living in a nursing home, had Alzheimer’s disease.

During a career of more than 50 years, Mr. Bacon designed covers for more than 6,500 books, including “Slaughterhouse-Five” by Kurt Vonnegut, “Ragtime” by E. L. Doctorow, “The Power Broker” by Robert Caro, “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” by Ken Kesey, “The Andromeda Strain” by Michael Crichton, “Jaws” by Peter Benchley and “Shogun,” by James Clavell. He is widely credited with pioneering what is known in the industry as the “Big Book Look” — typically a bold, minimalist design featuring prominent lettering and a small conceptual image. He did all of his designs, including the lettering, by hand.

One of his earliest and most imitated cover designs, for Meyer Levin’s 1956 novel, “Compulsion,” is composed of mostly gray blank space, with two small red figures running on the horizon, and a prominent title in ragged hand-drawn lettering.