[PULP ART IDEA MILL #10] Spillane by the Book

For my review of both the 1982 film adaptation and bits of the book itself (including the strip by Dr. Charlotte Manning pictured above), see the previous entry, no. 2 in the Reverie Series: Spillane posts.

For the third post in this mini-reverie on Spillane, I wanted to get in some "face time" with a few of my favorite editions of his work. My first-time viewing of THE GIRL HUNTERS back in March really set me on a path of (re)discovery, reminding me how much I loved paperback cover art (and book design in general) growing up. And that confluence, that rekindling of related interests, was basically the idea behind the Pulp Art Idea Mill series here on the site. 

As I spent time casting about for cover images from my adolescence—two of the best sites I found are here, and here (the former features a fair amount of commentary and background on the covers; the latter offers little context, but a staggering quantity)—I started zeroing in on the publication history of Spillane to see what I'd missed while focused on the likes of Lester Dent's DOC SAVAGE**, Maxwell Grant's THE SHADOW**, G.K. Chesterton's THURSDAY, Philip K. Dick's whole paranoid-Christian universe, Charles Williams' set of seven highly disturbing "supernatural thrillers," C.S. Lewis' THAT HIDEOUS STRENGTH, Philip MacDonald's LIST, and the like.

What I found was a series of Corgi paperback covers from the 60s: high-impact, tantalizingly abstract, dominated by distinct colors and compositions in the frame (and reminiscent of somebody else's candy-coded covers). I'm a bit unclear on artist info, though at least one site attributes the ME, HOOD! cover to Renato Fratini. What I wouldn't do to walk into a bookstore and find a whole clutch of these on the shelf.

The cover given to GIRL HUNTERS was what first made me take notice of these particular editions, as it bears striking resemblance to the corresponding scene in the 1963 film:

As both appeared in 1963, I can't guess which influenced the other, but the level of synchronicity is pleasing to say the least. More info on either this specific series of covers, or Corgi's paperbacks in general, would be much appreciated!

Leonard Jacobs

May, 2015

**For more fantastic Jim Steranko SHADOW covers, go here; some of James Bama's DOC SAVAGE work, here. 

pps. The presentation of Spillane in a kind of emptied physical space, almost floating (and, for some reason, always seated or reclining), reminds me very much of this sequence from Frank Miller's ELEKTRA LIVES AGAIN, a technique he would take to its negative-space limits in the various SIN CITY books.