Here’s a view of Lovecraft from 1950 that escaped the A Weird Writer in our Midst collection of early Lovecraft criticism and commentary…
Erroneous in facts, but a valid example of what some in 1950 might have thought of Lovecraft. What was Literary Lamas of New York (1950)? Archive.org doesn’t have it, so I can’t tell if the author went on to more commentary on Lovecraft, or if it was an isolated remark. The book appears to have been a coruscation of the pre-war and wartime mistreatment of talented writers by New York City publishers.
The full text of this book is on HathiTrust. It’s only 94 pages. The author listed, Jack Woodford, is a pseudonym of Josiah Pitts Woolfolk. The principal material on Lovecraft is 5 paragraphs on pages 27-28. The author tells the reader ”If you want the whole story write to August Derleth, Sauk City, Wisconsin.” While the book does blame the publishing industry for many talented writers not being published, it also pushes self-publishing. Tellingly, it was published by Vantage Press, the U.S.’s largest “vanity press,” which was ordered by New York State Supreme Court in 1990 to pay $3.5 million dollars to 2,200 of its defrauded authors.
Wonderful information, many thanks. The image I saw of a rare copy must have been angled to make it look more substantial than it actually was. 🙂 So, evidently it was a small vanity-press affair. Though one has to wonder if the press was in 1950 what it had become by 1990, forty years later?
Considering that the book is full of homophobic, antisemitic, and anti-Communist remarks…yeah, probably pretty much.
The interesting thing on this book is not so much Woodford’s holding Lovecraft up as a martyr of a good writer treated unfairly by the New York publishing houses and pulp magazine editors, it’s that he quotes from a letter from August Derleth. The archive of the August Derleth papers at the Wisconsin Historical Society has a folder for Derleth’s correspondence with Woodford, so that might be more interesting to read than the book itself.
Thanks for additional info. What with the computer failure and a magazine to put together, I haven’t had time to look at the book yet – now that I know it’s on Hathi.
An old forum post from 2011 from Richard A. Lupoff may interest future readers of this post…
“Nice to see Jack Woodford getting some attention again. I’m running a boutique imprint called Surinam Turtle Press, part of Ramble House, and we’re working on something of a Woodford Renaissance. Already in process — A PAIR OF JACKS (omnibus containing “Find the Motive” and “Loud Literary Lamas of New York”) and EVANGELICAL COCKROACH. We’ve got at least one more Woodford title in the pipeline and will consider others. BTW, his “smut” (so-called) was considered risque, even pornographic, in Woodford’s day. For the 21st Century reader, the novels are skillfully done romances with the most tepid, almost timid, of sexual content. Keep an eye out on our parent company’s website, http://www.ramblehouse.com, for information when the books are actually released.”
Doug Skinner remarked on the same thread…
“His cynical how-to book, “Trial and Error” (or “Writing and Selling”) is kind of a cult favorite. His novels are mostly smut, but his collection of short stories, “Evangelical Cockroach”, has some lively stuff in it.”
Lupoff got Woodford’s Cockroach book out and wrote the introduction. Three others too, including one containing a reprint of Lamas. For which there is a lengthy trailer post by Lupoff with some details on Woodford at http://www.ramblehouse.com/pairojackschapter.htm In which, interesting, he slips in another comment on George Sylvester Viereck… “Woodford also published a late fantasy novel by the controversial German-American poet-journalist-propagandist George Sylvester Viereck”. See my earlier post on Tentaclii on Lupoff and his claims re: Viereck.