 Before we go in, I should warn you that Isa might jump out from somewhere. Act surprised. She'll leave you alone after that. 
Above: a cover for the 1953 adventure Isa, written by René Roques and published by his Paris-based company Éditions R.R. Their cover art was often by Jef de Wulf, but this one is signed YB. We have no idea who that is, nor have we ever seen his or her work elsewhere, but it's an interesting effort. R.R. produced attractive covers even in collaboration with obscure artists, so some of the credit for their consistency probably goes to the company's art director—René Roques himself. Click his keywords below to see more.
 Relax, honey. They must be from that boat with the skull flag. I bet they're spring breakers on a booze cruise. 
The 1960 Fontana edition of Peter Cheyney's Dark Bahama, with its unlucky man being mauled by a shark, is one of the craziest mid-century paperback covers you'll see. By contrast, the earlier 1957 edition above from Pan Books goes a bit more traditional. It was painted by Henry Fox, easily recognizable thanks to his unique signature at lower left. The book is unique too. Feel free to read the earlier write-up to find out how.
 If you jump without looking you might get swept away. 
The book you see above, a 1958 Popular Library edition of The Red Room by Belgian author Françoise Mallet-Joris, was picked up for us by a friend who thought he was buying a pulp novel. He was attracted by the cover, and it's indeed fine work, from the skilled brush (and possibly ink quill and charcoal pencil) of Mitchell Hooks. As for the novel, it was originally published in 1955 as La chambre rouge and was a sequel to 1951's Le rempart des Béguines.
When someone buys us a book we always read it out of appreciation and respect, even romance novels, and in reading The Red Room we were reminded once again of the skill gap between literary and crime fiction. There are obviously excellent, transcendent crime writers (and literary fiction that misses the mark), but Mallet-Joris—even translated—spins evocative phrases as deftly as a weaver with a loom. Like this one:
The presence of winter—vulgar winter, befurred and jangling her crystal adornments—was scarcely felt in the small white and gold drawing room.
Isn't that nice? It's not Hammett describing a gangster popping off shots in a crowded bar, but it's still fun to read. The tale is a coming of age breast-beater set in Gers, France in which the main character, eighteen-year-old Hélène Noris decides to steal the dashing young film director her hated stepmother Tamara has earmarked for extra-marital games. That actually sounds kind of pulp, doesn't it? Well, just wait.
At some point it becomes clear that Hélène had been Tamara's young lover (probably this is the central plot of the previous book). Tamara and Hélène had been carrying on, but in order to secure for herself a stable existence Tamara decided to marry Hélène's father. Thus, The Red Room charts Hélène as she impulsively steals her stepmother's crush, only to find herself getting in too deep with someone who's more experienced and decisive than any man she's known.
Needless to say, that plot sounds like some of the sleaze novels we highlight here, which would make you wonder, in terms of public perception, at which point the lowbrow becomes highbrow. And the easy answer to that is: when you can write like Mallet-Joris and critics adore you. Overall, The Red Room is probably a little too genteel and interiorized for most pulp readers, but we liked it. Consider that less a recommendation than an acknowledgment of talent.
 
 That's a tempting invitation, but the hospital has a very strict code of ethics. So we'll have to do it at your place. 
Above: a Harry Barton cover for Stuart Friedman's 1960 sleazer The Way We Love, an “unconventional novels of manners and morals in a modern hospital.” Uh huh. We bet we know what's unconventional about it. Something of note here: the cover for Friedman's 1962 effort The Surgeons is a near-duplicate of this, but painted by Harry Schaare. We wonder if that's chance, or if Monarch's art director influenced the final product. Curious. We have a lot more medical covers in the website. See a small portion of them here, here, here, here, here, and here.
 Thank you very much. Next I'd like to massacre a song by Joan Baez. 
Since we took a look at Barbara Walton's cover work recently we thought we'd circle back to her with an effort for John D. MacDonald's I Could Go On Singing, originally published in 1963 with this Robert Hale Ltd. hardback coming in ’64. This is very different, very minimalist work from Walton compared to what we showed you last time, but it just demonstrates her broad range. It's different work for pop fiction icon MacDonald too, as it was a novelization for a 1963 movie of the same name. Hey, whatever pays the bills. We didn't read it, but we gather that he managed to put his unique stamp on it.
 This ain't Happy Days and he ain't the Fonz. 
Since reading William R. Cox's 1961 thriller Death Comes Early we'd been looking around for more from him and located 1958's Hell To Pay, which you see above with a Robert Schulz cover. Cox writes in that same cool style we noted before, as he combines two crime sub-genres—organized crime, and juvenile delinquency. His main character Tom Kincaid is a successful NYC gambler who gets swept up in a mafia takeover centered around crooked boxing. Kincaid is thought by a kingpin named Mosski to be working for an upstart mob, which essentially makes this a find-the-real-killer novel in the sense that if Kincaid can't prove he isn't setting up Mosski his ass is grass. The book has in abundance generation gap musings, shady mingling between criminals and cops, poker described in hand-by-hand detail, and a lot of shooting and/or brutal beatings. Cox provides several good secondary characters, particularly Kincaid's been-around-the-block girlfriend Jean Harper. She's flawed, but then so is everyone here. There's a sequel to Hell To Pay, and we're onto that already. 
 Maybe if we were high we'd have bought it. 
We ran across this on mercadolibre.com. It's Ian Fleming's Goldfinger from Ediciones Albon, out of Colombia, published in 1964. The vendor was asking 200 for this. Pesos? No—dollars. That's a lot of plata. We'd rather spend the money on actual Colombian gold, so we took a pass. But we love the cover.
 She could be Ursula Andress. 
Above: one of many covers for H. Rider Haggard's all-time classic She, aka She: A History of Adventure, about the cruel, beautiful, and powerful ruler of a lost world. We chose this one because the art is based on the 1965 movie adaptation starring Ursula Andress, as you can discern at a glance. And if not, we added an Andress shot below from the film for comparison's sake. You wouldn't quite call this paperback edition from London based Hodder & Stoughton a tie-in—the movie came out in 1965 in Britain, whereas the paperback is from 1968. But Andress never goes out of style. You could probably put her on a book cover now and it would sell like potato chips. We're going to screen her version of She in a bit, and report back. We already checked out one of the other dozen versions, 1935's effort starring Helen Gahagan, which you can read about here if you're curious. 
 She never has unprotected sex. 
Above: an alternate cover for Milton K. Ozaki's 1952 thriller The Deadly Pick-Up. We use “thriller” loosely, because it wasn't a very involving book. But both covers are excellent. This one is by Rudy Nappi. You can see the other, by an uncredited artist, here.
|
 |
The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1933—The Gestapo Is Formed
The Geheime Staatspolizei, aka Gestapo, the official secret police force of Nazi Germany, is established. It begins under the administration of SS leader Heinrich Himmler in his position as Chief of German Police, but by 1939 is administered by the Reichssicherheitshauptamt, or Reich Main Security Office, and is a feared entity in every corner of Germany and beyond. 1937—Guernica Is Bombed
In Spain during the Spanish Civil War, the Basque town of Guernica is bombed by the German Luftwaffe, resulting in widespread destruction and casualties. The Basque government reports 1,654 people killed, while later research suggests far fewer deaths, but regardless, Guernica is viewed as an example of terror bombing and other countries learn that Nazi Germany is committed to that tactic. The bombing also becomes inspiration for Pablo Picasso, resulting in a protest painting that is not only his most famous work, but one the most important pieces of art ever produced. 1939—Batman Debuts
In Detective Comics #27, DC Comics publishes its second major superhero, Batman, who becomes one of the most popular comic book characters of all time, and then a popular camp television series starring Adam West, and lastly a multi-million dollar movie franchise starring Michael Keaton, then George Clooney, and finally Christian Bale. 1953—Crick and Watson Publish DNA Results
British scientists James D Watson and Francis Crick publish an article detailing their discovery of the existence and structure of deoxyribonucleic acid, or DNA, in Nature magazine. Their findings answer one of the oldest and most fundamental questions of biology, that of how living things reproduce themselves. 1967—First Space Program Casualty Occurs
Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov dies in Soyuz 1 when, during re-entry into Earth's atmosphere after more than ten successful orbits, the capsule's main parachute fails to deploy properly, and the backup chute becomes entangled in the first. The capsule's descent is slowed, but it still hits the ground at about 90 mph, at which point it bursts into flames. Komarov is the first human to die during a space mission.
|
|
|
It's easy. We have an uploader that makes it a snap. Use it to submit your art, text, header, and subhead. Your post can be funny, serious, or anything in between, as long as it's vintage pulp. You'll get a byline and experience the fleeting pride of free authorship. We'll edit your post for typos, but the rest is up to you. Click here to give us your best shot.
|
|
