Comics, Pulps, and Paperbacks: Why such a discrepancy in values? 25 25

[themagicrobot]

When I find an old paperback written by someone I've never heard of I like to do a quick Interweb search to find out more. It seems Reginald Evelyn Peter Southouse-Cheyney (1896 - 1951) was British, but wrote most of his books about an FBI agent by the odd name of  Lemmy Caution. More oddness. He started his career by winning a bet that he couldn't write a novel in "the American style". Extreme oddness. Lemmy Caution featured in 15 movies, mostly French and none of them were English-speaking. Ultimate oddness. The final Lemmy Caution movie was the 1965 Science Fiction movie Alphaville.

 

 

 

PS In the movies Lemmy Caution was always played by the expat American actor Eddie Constantine. I know the DC character John Constantine was originally based on the appearance of Sting, but I wonder if Alan Moore had seen Alphaville and recalled, even if subconsciously the surname of the lead?  It is certainly the sort of thing he would do.

 

[Darwination]

On 9/28/2023 at 4:18 AM, themagicrobot said:

 

 

 

 

 

Neat post, MR!

Any chance of you paperback people can ID the artist for this one?

[OtherEric]

On 9/28/2023 at 2:18 AM, themagicrobot said:

When I find an old paperback written by someone I've never heard of I like to do a quick Interweb search to find out more. It seems Reginald Evelyn Peter Southouse-Cheyney (1896 - 1951) was British, but wrote most of his books about an FBI agent by the odd name of  Lemmy Caution. More oddness. He started his career by winning a bet that he couldn't write a novel in "the American style". Extreme oddness. Lemmy Caution featured in 15 movies, mostly French and none of them were English-speaking. Ultimate oddness. The final Lemmy Caution movie was the 1965 Science Fiction movie Alphaville.

The Only Peter Cheyney books I have are from the Murder Mystery Monthly series:

 

[themagicrobot]

I love the above odd cover interpretation of a British bobby!. Slim Callaghan featured in "They never say when" was a British detective so Mr Cheyney didn't only write in "the American style" or set everything in the US. He seems to have been a larger than life character who lived his life in a similar manner to the characters he wrote about. Anyone who sported a monacle had to be eccentric! I'm looking out for this book about his life, but preferbly one that is cheaper than AU $100 and available on my side of the planet.

  

 

Edited September 28, 2023 by themagicrobot

[OtherEric]

On 9/28/2023 at 10:22 AM, themagicrobot said:

I love the above odd cover interpretation of a British bobby!. Slim Callaghan featured in "They never say when" was a British detective so Mr Cheyney didn't only write in "the American style". He seems to have been a larger than life character who lived his life in a similar manner to the characters he wrote about. Anyone who sported a monacle had to be eccentric! I'm looking out for this book about his life, but preferbly one that is cheaper than AU $100 and available on my side of the planet.

 

I missed one of the Slim Callaghan MMM's last post.  I think I have all of the MMM's he did:

 

[themagicrobot]

He was very popular in Europe. Looking at eBay there are currently far more of his books for sale in France than here in the UK. Many French paperbacks appear quite modern with photo covers which is surprising when his most recent work was in 1951.

 

 

 

 

[Surfing Alien]

On 9/27/2023 at 7:26 PM, Darwination said:

This cover is by Charles Copeland for sure

[Surfing Alien]

On 9/28/2023 at 4:41 AM, themagicrobot said:

 

Hungry Men was painted by Harry Schaare, Man Hungry by Paul Rader, obviously.

[Surfing Alien]

Here's a couple of Cheyney's with glossy American GGA, which I much prefer.

Mistress Murder (originally One of Those Things) Avon 349 cover by Raymond Johnson - this is a Terry O'Day mystery

I'll Bring Her Back (originally Dark Bahama), Eton Books E115  A Julian Isles mystery. Cover art uncredited, probably Johnson or Victor Olsen

 

 

 

[damonwad]

On 9/28/2023 at 9:47 AM, OtherEric said:

The Only Peter Cheyney books I have are from the Murder Mystery Monthly series:

 

Avon #80 is by Cheney and has the same cover art as the MMM #15 (without the skulls) but has a different title. Not sure if it's the same book though.

[OtherEric]

On 9/28/2023 at 4:57 PM, damonwad said:

Avon #80 is by Cheney and has the same cover art as the MMM #15 (without the skulls) but has a different title. Not sure if it's the same book though.

Not the same if Wikipedia is to be believed, but who knows ?

[Darwination]

On 9/28/2023 at 1:13 PM, Surfing Alien said:

Hungry Men was painted by Harry Schaare, Man Hungry by Paul Rader, obviously.

I thought you might have had the name wrong for Harry Schaare, even as I was thinking this doesn't look like the Schaare I know from the pulps:

https://www.pulpartists.com/Schaare.html

I wonder if C.R. " D  I   C   K " Schaare there is the dad of Harry...  The bio details line up - but not exactly - and I can't seem to get at the Social Security database like I used to (been a while since I tried). 

As David Saunder's pulp wiki mentions, C.R. Schaare is best known for his steady work at The Ring in the 30s, but he also did some pulp covers.

What Saunders doesn't mention in the batch of titles listed is the bit of work he did in the girlie pulps (my particular specialty)

I don't actually own any of these (which might be a good indicator I'm not too crazy about his girlie stuff, though this first one passes muster)

I'm pretty sure the above is after one of Cheri Herouard's common uses of the the mask motif in La Vie Parisienne but could not find the exact painting

Hmm, after a little more sleuthing (in C.R.'s kids' obituaries) I'm thinking they are unrelated after all - carry on

Edited September 29, 2023 by Darwination

[Surfing Alien]

On 9/28/2023 at 9:45 PM, Darwination said:

I thought you might have had the name wrong for Harry Schaare, even as I was thinking this doesn't look like the Schaare I know from the pulps:

https://www.pulpartists.com/Schaare.html

I wonder if C.R. "" Schaare there is the dad of Harry...  The bio details line up - but not exactly - and I can't seem to get at the Social Security database like I used to (been a while since I tried). 

As David Saunder's pulp wiki there mentions, C.R. Schaare is best known for his steady work at The Ring in the 30s, but he also did some pulp covers.

What Saunders doesn't mention in the batch of titles listed is the bit of work he did in the girlie pulps (my particular specialty)

I don't actually own any of these (which might be a good indicator I'm not too crazy about his girlie stuff, though this first one passes muster)

I'm pretty sure the above is after one of Cheri Herouard's common uses of the the mask motif in La Vie Parisienne but could not find the exact painting

Hmm, after a little more sleuthing (in C.R.'s kids' obituaries) I'm thinking they are unrelated after all - carry on

C.R. is Harry's Uncle.

[Darwination]

On 9/28/2023 at 8:46 PM, Surfing Alien said:

C.R. is Harry's Uncle.

[Surfing Alien]

Harry did some fine covers...

[Randall Dowling]

On 9/28/2023 at 10:33 PM, Surfing Alien said:

Harry did some fine covers...

More girls!

[Surfing Alien]

On 9/28/2023 at 9:45 PM, Darwination said:

I thought you might have had the name wrong for Harry Schaare, even as I was thinking this doesn't look like the Schaare I know from the pulps:

https://www.pulpartists.com/Schaare.html

I wonder if C.R. " D  I   C   K " Schaare there is the dad of Harry...  The bio details line up - but not exactly - and I can't seem to get at the Social Security database like I used to (been a while since I tried). 

As David Saunder's pulp wiki mentions, C.R. Schaare is best known for his steady work at The Ring in the 30s, but he also did some pulp covers.

What Saunders doesn't mention in the batch of titles listed is the bit of work he did in the girlie pulps (my particular specialty)

I don't actually own any of these (which might be a good indicator I'm not too crazy about his girlie stuff, though this first one passes muster)

I'm pretty sure the above is after one of Cheri Herouard's common uses of the the mask motif in La Vie Parisienne but could not find the exact painting

Hmm, after a little more sleuthing (in C.R.'s kids' obituaries) I'm thinking they are unrelated after all - carry on

I actually really like the June and July Ginger girls and the Gun Moll girl has guns and is using them, so I like her extra

 

[Darwination]

Yeah, that Gun Molls is fanstastic (even if she's got that tiny gun syndrome that got passed around in the pulps).  Whatever was done to that image is a bit of travesty (not by me!) so I grabbed a better one.  I'll go ahead and post a run of his Gun Moll covers since I just went looking.  When it comes to my own files and indexes, I don't spend much time labeling most thumbnails or low res images.  They are nice to have for the record but usually useless in terms of artist identification much less art appreciation (though the indexes at Galactic Central can help pair a thumbnail with an ID).  Big images are what I like, big images are what I share when I can

There's some moire in there but the whites aren't messed up.  The v01n01 by the way 

This one was up in March at one of the excellent Kump auctions, price 1680

Also this year at Heritage, price $528

others

 

Edited September 29, 2023 by Darwination

[TupennyConan]

Not sure where to post this so here ya go ~

https://www.forbes.com/sites/maryroeloffs/2023/09/28/two-books-break-book-sales-records-at-christies-auction---here-are-the-most-expensive-books-ever-sold/amp/

[Surfing Alien]

On 9/29/2023 at 5:41 PM, TupennyConan said:

Not sure where to post this so here ya go ~

https://www.forbes.com/sites/maryroeloffs/2023/09/28/two-books-break-book-sales-records-at-christies-auction---here-are-the-most-expensive-books-ever-sold/amp/

An incredible collection he had and I'm not surprised at all with the results. I also agree about a general jump in interest for vintage books. I'm certainly seeing it in the inability to place or replace desirable vintage paperbacks, especially 40's & 50's books.

Here's a link to the results:

https://www.christies.com/auction/auction-21924-cks/browse-lots?page=3&sortby=lotnumber

and my take on the sale is that this is a spectacular collection - a case of the stars aligning perfectly. A very famous and beloved provenance with impeccable taste and the pockets to obtain the very best of what he collected. Who knew???