RARA-AVIS: Hard-Boiled anthology

From: Moorich2@aol.com
Date: 28 Feb 2003


In a message dated 2/27/03 1:56:13 PM Eastern Standard Time, owner-rara-avis@icomm.ca writes:

<<
 Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2003 07:28:33 -0500
 From: Robison Michael R CNIN < Robison_M@crane.navy.mil>
 Subject: RARA-AVIS: Hardboiled Omnibus question
 
 I have the following information on Shaw's Hardboiled Omnibus.
 Can anyone tell me which stories are excluded from the paper-
 back?
 
 "The Hard-Boiled Omnibus" edited by Joseph T. Shaw, Simon & Schuster, 1946.
 (The 1st and greatest anthology. essential. Released as a paperback years
 many years later, missing some stories)
 Shaw, Joseph T, Introduction
 Des Ormeaux, J.J.(Forrest Rosaire) "The Devil Suit.", July 1932
 Shay, Reuben Jennings "Taking His Time.", January 1931
 Hammett, Dashiell "Fly Paper.", August 1929
 Decolta, Ramon(Raoul Whitfield) "Death in the Pasig.", March 1930
 Chandler, Raymond "The Man Who Liked Dogs.". March 1936
 Davis, Norbert "Red Goose.", February 1934
 Coxe, George Harmon "Murder Mixup.", May 1936
 Cain, Paul (Peter Ruric) "Red 71.", December 1932
 Whitfield, Raoul "Inside Job.", February 1932
 Dent, Lester "Sail", October 1936
 Booth, Charles G. "Sister Act.", February 1933
 Walsh, Thomas "Best Man.", October 1934
 Lybeck, Ed "Kick-Back.", January 1932
 Torrey, Roger "Clean Sweep.", February 1934
 Tinsley, Theodore "South Wind.", November 1932
 "The Sleeping and the Dead", edited by August Derleth, ?. 1947
 Wandrei, Howard "The Last Pin", February 1940"
  
 Thank you, miker >>

Miker, you let the cursor go two lines too long when you cut and pasted the contents of the Shaw anthology. The Derleth reference is to a fantasy/horror anthology that he edited. The Howard Wandrei story is in that anthology.

I have both editions and the missing stories are by Des Ormeaux (Rosaire), Coxe and Booth. My experience is that the hardback is not that uncommon and I've seen decent prices on copies missing the dust jacket. Maybe I've just been lucky.

You will notice there is no story by Erle Stanley Gardner. I don't have his bio handy but my memory is that he was irritated with Shaw who he felt was claiming too much credit and would not give permission. Gardner pointed out that many of the better known writers in Black Mask (Hammett was another one besides Gardner himself) had stories in the magazine prior to Shaw's editorship.

Chandler was angry at the story Shaw reprinted. It was one of those that had been borrowed from for one of his novels, or as he put it "cannibalized" and his agent had strict instructions not to alloow any reprints of those. Chandler (who claimed to have suggested the anthology idea to Shaw) said he signed the permission form while he was busy and distracted at Paramount. We know all this detail because when Pocket Books came out with their reprint, Chandler received a letter from E. Howard Hunt (then with the American Embassy in Mexico City undercover for the CIA) who complained of the
"self-plagiarism." He answered it in great detail ending with the remark that Hunt was the only person to ever complain other than Chandler himself.

Richard Moore

--
# To unsubscribe from the regular list, say "unsubscribe rara-avis" to
# majordomo@icomm.ca.  This will not work for the digest version.
# The web pages for the list are at http://www.miskatonic.org/rara-avis/ .



This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 28 Feb 2003 EST