Just over 20 years ago now a teacher walked into my office and said that he had just found a bag of books on the street and would I like them. Of course I said Yes and in the books came.
Quick look at the top of the bag – looked like a whole load of pornesque pulp fiction from the late 1950’s and early 1960’s. Could be interesting period curiosities.
So the bag sat unexplored in the back corner of the office until I changed jobs and so – after several moves – the bag and the books ended up in the basement, still unexplored. Now – in the uncluttering phase – time to take a look.
So there they are – still in their vintage King Kullen “you can have it all” supermarket bag. And finally they get pulled out – a little fragile now, the pages brown and some of them ready to crumble. But the covers are still nice and lurid.
So one after the other I pull them out – each one a little less appealing than the one before.
And then – what’s this masquerading as drug store porn? The Thorn in the Flesh. Promising title for a punter in search of steamy reading.
It’s a collection of seven short stories by D.H.Lawrence published by the Berkeley Medallion in 1959. Purchase price 35 cents.
It’s a bit of a collector’s item apparently – a good copy now will cost you $25.
But gosh – it’s by the author of the infamous Lady Chatterley’s Lover – the Berkley Medallion press taking advantage of that notoriety with a blurb that is a cross between the sensational and high literary endorsement.
The title story is about a Prussian soldier with a fear of heights who loses bladder control after being forced to climb a wall.
He strikes out at a sergeant who humiliates him and runs away. It does have a sexual encounter in it – but not 1959 pulp fiction worthy.
The blurb writers do their best to amp up the heat. “Flashing glimpses into the byways of love” says the back cover with blurbs from Anthony West, F.R.Leavis and T.S.Eliot.
One of the stories was even a set text for my GCE ‘O’ levels and amusing to think of someone poring over the emotionally painful pits and pubs of Odour of Chrysanthemums to get to the steamy bits.
Of course, Lawrence detractors would say he belongs there amid the crumbling ickiness and the extremely boring of mid 20th century pulp fiction.
The issue now is not Lawrence’s literary reputation but what to do with 50 or so examples of mid 20th century pulp fiction.
Anyone have any suggestions?
What a grand collection you have!
Were there any books by Kilgore Trout?
(see
…Trout, who has supposedly written over 117 novels and over 2000 short stories, is usually described as an unappreciated science fiction writer whose works are used only as filler material in pornographic magazines…..
No Kilgore Trout. So it goes. (Although there is a rumor that his son was seen at Bernie Sanders HQ in 2016.) There are a couple from Donald Westlake writing as Alan Marshall. And I think there’s a Sheldon Lord (pen name of Lawrence Block.)
What a window into the past and a reminder that human nature doesn’t change. There is a style to these books, a formula, like pulp detective stories of the same era. I like the idea of random extracts the earlier commenter mentioned. Could lead to all kinds of tangents.
Without doubt there is a market for them.internet search e bay or local bookstore may reveal where..or do u belong to a recycle group…always worth it…or a college with a gender or feminist literary interest..or a bookstore in the city
. I must say i dont much care for the covers..or whats inside but important part of history. So see if u can rehome xx
Thanks everyone for the suggestions.
A comparable dilemma to the several boxes worth of Psychic Book Club volumes from the bungalow. Tosh and twaddle but book destruction doesn’t seem right.
They look like an art project, to me. Not that I’m an artist…
Yes. Good collage material for a clever person. And all kinds of mix and match fictional “consequences”.
There may be collectors out there who would buy them from you!
I’m sure you’re right. But …. always easier said than actually done.
I had that same idea! Take the first sentence of every page 21 and 72 or whatever plus a mish-mash of first and lasts and see what you have.
But then – there’s still the actual books. Although a few openings and they would be dust.
Take random extracts from them all, put them together, give it a rambunctious name, and voila, a best-seller.