<P> The inner sleeve features a black - and - white photograph of a door with a hand near the handle . It was some years later before Saville discovered that the photograph was Hand Through a Doorway, a well - known picture by Ralph Gibson . Author Chris Ott suggests that the album title was probably a reference to Marcel Proust's Remembrance of Things Past . </P> <P> Unknown Pleasures was initially printed in a run of 10,000 copies, with 5,000 copies being sold within the first two weeks of release, and a further 10,000 copies being sold over the following six months . Initially, sales of Unknown Pleasures were slow until the release of the non-album single, "Transmission", and unsold copies occupied the Factory Records office in the flat of label co-founder Alan Erasmus . </P> <P> Following the release of "Transmission", Unknown Pleasures sold out of its initial pressing, with this prompting further pressings . Unknown Pleasures created approximately £ 50,000 in profit, to be shared between Factory Records and the band; however, Tony Wilson spent most of these profits on Factory projects . By the conclusion of a critically acclaimed promotional tour supporting Buzzcocks in November 1979, Unknown Pleasures had neared 15,000 copies sold . </P> <P> Unknown Pleasures failed to chart on the UK Albums Chart . However, following Curtis's suicide in May 1980 and the release of their second album, Closer, in July, it was reissued and reached No. 71 at the end of that August . It fared better on the UK Indie Chart, placing at No. 2 on the first chart to be published in January 1980 and going on to top the chart following its reissue, spending 136 weeks on the chart in total . </P>

What does the joy division album cover mean