Comments on: Mass-market paperback postmodernism

By: The Thrill Is Gone? « Conversational Reading

The Thrill Is Gone? « Conversational Reading — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 12:12:39 +0000

[...] also Scott Bryan Wilson’s thoughts on book and autograph collecting at The Constant [...]

By: The Constant Conversation | (In)disposable Books

The Constant Conversation | (In)disposable Books — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 02:02:38 +0000

[...] Waxman ⋅ March 22, 2010 ⋅ Post a comment (In)disposable BooksShareA few posts back, Scott Bryan Wilson rhapsodized about some great mass market paperbacks in his personal collection that had been unlikely to get the mass market treatment. His photos didn’t get me thinking [...]

By: Gregory Flanders

Gregory Flanders — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 02:10:39 +0000

Spent the afternoon at a used bookstore here in Chicago, browsing the MMF’s after reading this post. Bought five or six of them: a couple of Joseph Conrads, Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Mary McCarthy’s The Groves of the Academy, etc.

It wasn’t until I walked out of the store that I noticed the John Cheever novel I’d bought for $1.50, Falconer, was signed by Cheever and dedicated to John Callaway, a local broadcasting legend here in Chicago.

Thanks guys, you helped make my day.

By: Caleb Powell

Caleb Powell — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 01:02:13 +0000

I love my paperbacks, and even have that exact copy of Barth’s End of the Road. Call me conservative, but I don’t mind the cheap, thin pages.

My wife, on the other hand, is done with a book after the first reading, and she doesn’t understand my compulsion to keep books I’ve already read.

The Kindle generation, or the generation that reads on a screen but not a page, will be formidable, but hopefully (if I have my way) our children will appreciate a shelf or two filled with books.

By: Shopiere » Blog Archive » Mass market paperbacks

Shopiere » Blog Archive » Mass market paperbacks — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 16:53:34 +0000

[...] DeLillo, etc.) who got the mass market treatment. Over at The Constant Conversation, we’re having a big nostalgia-fest, jumping off of Scott Bryan Wilson’s excellent post (with pictures) on the mass market paperbacks [...]

By: Bring Back the Mass Market Paperback! « Conversational Reading

Bring Back the Mass Market Paperback! « Conversational Reading — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 11:07:30 +0000

By: Soo Jin Oh

Soo Jin Oh — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 04:45:06 +0000

Going back to the nostalgia factor, I can’t describe what it was like to find some of my father’s old paperbacks on a trip back my parents’ old house in South Korea. My father had been teaching himself English, so he had these mass market paperbacks of D.H. Lawrence. Lady Chatterley’s Lover (if you are going to teach yourself a language, some sex scenes have got to help!) includes the presiding judge’s opinion on the obscenity trial. Sons and Lovers has a great photo still from the movie version. Both editions are over 50 years old with quite yellow paper, but the spines and covers are intact. All this for 35 cent and 50 cent books.

On the one hand, they are cheap durable books. But, more importantly, they are artifacts from my father’s younger days, and attest to his aspirations and dreams as a young man in South Korea at a time when that nation meant little to most English-speakers except for the Korean War. It’s hard to imagine e-book files resonating with as much meaning to future children.

By: Scott Esposito

Scott Esposito — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 02:59:01 +0000

Totally with you guys on the Harper Perennial. Thing that sucks is, they’re got the rights to some of the best fiction of the 20th century. Too bad it has to look like that . . .

By: mike

mike — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 01:25:23 +0000

Yeah, the title selection wasn’t really my cup of tea, either. And yes, Soo Jin, those Harper Perennial paperbacks are frail.

By: Jeff Waxman

Jeff Waxman — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 01:20:21 +0000

I’m with you, John. And another title? FAST FOOD NATION. What?

Where’s OLD MAN & THE SEA or BEL CANTO?