deepundergroundpoetry.com
One Look At This Pulp Book
One look at this pulp book and I see why she's no longer into men.
Published 14th Nov 2022
Author's Note
This is my first one line haiku poem in which one person has discovered something new about a friend.
All writing remains the property of the author. Don't use it for any purpose without their permission.
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The author encourages honest critique.
15th Nov 2022 00:56am
15th Nov 2022 10:34pm
17th Nov 2022 7:01pm
I have dispose of thousands of books in my life, and often I think of the vintage paperbacks merely a few which I used to have I have shed along the way and reminisce with dear fond memories their smell, their feel, and their freakin' OMG (& sometimes WTF) How Are Their Covers So Cool!!!???
BIG LIKE, as poet_speak always says...
BIG LIKE, as poet_speak always says...
18th Nov 2022 8:08pm
23rd Nov 2022 1:43am
I mean, is it a classic? Undoubtedly, on one or another level. Paperback pulp is and has always been consumed/collected on the basis of a variety of factors, and as "object de book," (book as artifact) cover art and blurb-wording are obviously two of the largest factors.
The cover art here has several attractive distinctions. The single, “hypnotic-woo” circle which encompasses both of the protagonists' upper torsos and heads; the astute rendering of the foregrounded individual's attentive pose, and the sensitivity line in the look of "wist" upon her profiled lips; the subtlety in the pendulumness of the shape, behind her blouse, of her breast; the folds and texture of her clothes and sash. The crosshatch pattern on her sleeve and the way that interfaces with the circle of woo as that sweeps, from below her armpit, across her elbow and up to the back of the backgrounded figure’s neck—the nape of the “object-of-desire.”
And look at the cuff of her left trouser leg, a subtle detail which suggests movement of “sitting up-ness” in vibrancy—the viewer is watching a living, active scene at it plays out in “reel time,” right before their eyes, the entire scene suggesting the emotive drama which the blurb promises will be found within the novel’s pages.
Which brings us to the blurb. Pulp was consumed by every social strata. Sometimes as the primary component of an individuals reading matter, other times as a “guilty pleasure” by those with more rarefied tastes (read: those with with “more money”). Pulp was inexpensive. Purchased at newsstands, “five and dime” stores, druggists—the pharmacy with a lunch counter: Walgreens and every other innumerable type place like those. Something for everyone.
The blurb is sensitive, rather than trying to shock, and conveys an emotional truth—the reality, which all gay man and women faced, of their relationships— “...they shared an intimacy which society scorned.”
It also contains a dead-letter-drop truth. It elucidates “a Secret.” A young person, 12, 15, 20, 25, (even 30 or not-so-young older, depending on nievetie and/or age of coming-out to oneself) discovering, perhaps with anguish, that all is possibly not heterosexual within their desires, is not necessarily going to put two and two together immediately about how they would manage the secrecy of a relationship.
But almost everyone wants and envisions cohabitory relationship as blessed adjunct to “ falling in love.” The idea that that could never happen due to social (everyone they have ever known) approbation is/was a large part of the anguish of being gay in a homophobic society.
So the understanding really was often one of relief , and could arrive like a mike-drop realization. “…Oh. ‘Roommates.’ This means I could still fall in love, and could still have and be a happy, because all we would have to do is have two rooms, and call ourselves…Roommates.”
The blurb proclaims that it is a probably more a book for persons who wish to read a romance novel about the lives of female gay persons, rather than a book for heterosexual men who want to read a lusty tale about two babes getting it on.
So all of these factors, beyond the literary merit of the book, add up to a solid, “Yeah, total classic…” to the eye of a collector.
I prefer to riff on it than to actually look the book or its author up, so I have no idea of its merit as a piece of writing, but beyond that, based on all these other factors, it adds up to a solid “Yeah, totally worthwhile classic…”, at least to the collector’s eye.
The cover art here has several attractive distinctions. The single, “hypnotic-woo” circle which encompasses both of the protagonists' upper torsos and heads; the astute rendering of the foregrounded individual's attentive pose, and the sensitivity line in the look of "wist" upon her profiled lips; the subtlety in the pendulumness of the shape, behind her blouse, of her breast; the folds and texture of her clothes and sash. The crosshatch pattern on her sleeve and the way that interfaces with the circle of woo as that sweeps, from below her armpit, across her elbow and up to the back of the backgrounded figure’s neck—the nape of the “object-of-desire.”
And look at the cuff of her left trouser leg, a subtle detail which suggests movement of “sitting up-ness” in vibrancy—the viewer is watching a living, active scene at it plays out in “reel time,” right before their eyes, the entire scene suggesting the emotive drama which the blurb promises will be found within the novel’s pages.
Which brings us to the blurb. Pulp was consumed by every social strata. Sometimes as the primary component of an individuals reading matter, other times as a “guilty pleasure” by those with more rarefied tastes (read: those with with “more money”). Pulp was inexpensive. Purchased at newsstands, “five and dime” stores, druggists—the pharmacy with a lunch counter: Walgreens and every other innumerable type place like those. Something for everyone.
The blurb is sensitive, rather than trying to shock, and conveys an emotional truth—the reality, which all gay man and women faced, of their relationships— “...they shared an intimacy which society scorned.”
It also contains a dead-letter-drop truth. It elucidates “a Secret.” A young person, 12, 15, 20, 25, (even 30 or not-so-young older, depending on nievetie and/or age of coming-out to oneself) discovering, perhaps with anguish, that all is possibly not heterosexual within their desires, is not necessarily going to put two and two together immediately about how they would manage the secrecy of a relationship.
But almost everyone wants and envisions cohabitory relationship as blessed adjunct to “ falling in love.” The idea that that could never happen due to social (everyone they have ever known) approbation is/was a large part of the anguish of being gay in a homophobic society.
So the understanding really was often one of relief , and could arrive like a mike-drop realization. “…Oh. ‘Roommates.’ This means I could still fall in love, and could still have and be a happy, because all we would have to do is have two rooms, and call ourselves…Roommates.”
The blurb proclaims that it is a probably more a book for persons who wish to read a romance novel about the lives of female gay persons, rather than a book for heterosexual men who want to read a lusty tale about two babes getting it on.
So all of these factors, beyond the literary merit of the book, add up to a solid, “Yeah, total classic…” to the eye of a collector.
I prefer to riff on it than to actually look the book or its author up, so I have no idea of its merit as a piece of writing, but beyond that, based on all these other factors, it adds up to a solid “Yeah, totally worthwhile classic…”, at least to the collector’s eye.
