Friday, March 6, 2015

Paperback 864: A Man Called Spade / Dashiell Hammett (Dell 411)

Paperback 864: Dell 411 (2nd ptg, 1st thus, 1950)

Title: A Man Called Spade
Author: Dashiell Hammett
Cover artist: Robert Stanley

Estimated value: $30

Dell411
Best things about this cover:

  • Spade's tie is super-excited for battle.
  • If you looked in a 1950 encyclopedia under "Private Dick": this picture. Chiseled. Determined. Behatted. Textbook.
  • Fear Hand Photobomb!
  • The scale / perspective is All wrong on this, but given that awesome green shirt, I'm gonna allow it.
  • "She screamed as Spade dashed up the stairs"—get it? "Dashed"? Yeah, you get it.
  • I have a friend whose kid is named Dashiell. Art Spiegelman's son is named Dashiell. This concludes the Dashiell-shout-out portion of my the program.


Dell411bc
Best things about this back cover:

  • Mapback!
  • Whoa. You know, sometimes we forget that 1940s apartments were all long couches and putting greens.
  • Max Bliss is the best unintentional porn name I've come across in a Long time.
  • I love a pitcher of Bloody Marys as much as anyone, but maybe ease up on the celery there.
  • Wow, Max Bliss's daughter is taking that "50 Shades of Grey" thing a bit literally.

'
Page 123~ (from "Too Many Have Lived")

She was short, square, as if carved economically from a cube. 

Talk about economical. That is some haiku-esque objectification right there. Classic.

~RP

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Tumblr]

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Vestibule!