Friday, July 29, 2011

Studio Tour Part Three: Books and magazines

Below the Batman collection I shared with you in part one of this studio tour, there's a three shelf bookcase, loaded with books and magazines. These are mostly haphazardly organized -- on these particular shelves simply because they fit there. Sometime down the line, I may attempt to get these in some kind of order. In the meantime, I'll just share with you a few favorites from this bunch.

There are many collectible toys and such in my studio -- but the bulk of my collection is books. I can't tell you how many hours I spent combing through used book stores, going to library sales, yard sales and flea markets -- always with an eye out for desirable titles. These days it's book stores, eBay and amazon that account for most of my book buying -- and it's slowed down a great deal -- but I still can't resist a great book.


1001 Riddles by cartoonist George Carlson was a childhood favorite. The copy I grew up with had no dustjacket and was full of crayon marks. As an adult, I picked up this clean copy in dj (jacket art not by Carlson, I was disappointed to discover) -- and still think it's a nifty little book.
Carlson's art does appear on the front boards of the book -- dig this great drawing of a laughing parrot.
Every page of this is chock full of drawings by Carlson. No crayon at all in this copy, thank goodness!
Anatomy and Drawing by Victor Perard is a wonderful art instruction book -- and has seen many printings. I love the embossed decoration on the front boards of this one.

Stan "the man" Lee signed my copy of Origins of Marvel Comics back in '75. My buddy Dave Askam and I skipped a day of high school to attend a lecture by Stan at Augustana College in Rock Island, Illinois. I was thrilled to get the autograph -- but found Stan's pronunciation of Spider-Man as "Spoyda-Man" a little disturbing! Also met Murray Bishoff, then a columnist for Alan Light's The Buyer's Guide for Comics Fandom for the first time at that event.


Ah -- a great used book find -- I paid a whopping 75 cents for this George Burns book about his life with Gracie -- a fantastic read and a real treasure.

Illustrated books make up a large part of my collection. Here is one of many gorgeous interior illustrations by Fritz Eichenberg for Reynard the Fox -- one of several books on this shelf that are part of the collection that came from my father's cousin Ruth -- there were a few too many to fit them all in "Ruth's bookcase" (see Part Two of this tour).

Another used book find. I was not familiar with S. G. Hulme Beaman's work before finding this volume -- but loved it on first sight.


Another case of discovering an illustrator on pulling this book off the shelf at a used book store (likely the Source in Davenport, Iowa) -- Kimo is richly illustrated and every page is a visual delight. Here's a link to a brief biography of artist Lucille Webster Holling.




The bottom shelf of this case is full of magazines -- mostly my Famous Monsters of Filmland collection -- but a number of other monster magazines and assorted titles -- below are a few highlights from the collection, starting with Marvel's Spectacular Spider-Man mags. That John Romita cover painting for #2 still strikes me as one of the best comic book covers ever.

Frank Frazetta and Mickey Spillane! These mags are practically oozing testosterone.

I spent hours and hours drinking in the pictures in this Super Heroes magazine when I was a kid. Imagining the adventures of these Saturday afternoon serial heroes was (mostly) a better experience than actually seeing the movies years later.

Monster mags! Spacemen! Aurora kit ad on the back of a comic book.

Random issues of Creepy and Eerie -- and the Phantom of the Paradise issue of Cinefantastique -- along with the only issue of Judge I own.

1st issue of Castle of Frankenstein!

More monster and movie mags.

Some early issues of Famous Monsters. I had many of these as a kid -- but they didn't survive -- many of them cut up to make collage posters that were displayed in my room -- and eventually thrown away. I've rebuilt this collection (which is far from complete) as an adult.

Creepy #1 and several issues of the FM doppleganger Monster World.

More books, collectibles and wacky stuff in part four -- coming soon!

1 comment:

Charles R. Rutledge said...

Enjoying the heck out of this tour, terry. You have some great stuff.