Pulp covers are glorious even when they’re terrible. There is something about a truly hideous piece of art. Pulp covers are a treasure trove of grotesqueries. Pulp, by definition, was printed on pulp paper, the cheapest printing material available in the post-war rationing period. The ink was cheap too, and the artists often had short deadlines and terrible primary material to draw from. What is surprising is not that so many pulp covers are tawdry disasters, but that there is beside this a large body of wonderful work from talented artists.

Bad Pulp

The contraints of pulp publishing and the often limited talents of artists created a medium where getting the book published was more important than the quality of what went on the cover. Even a skilled artist such as Norman Saunders could produce poor covers under these conditions. Apply the same pressures to mediocre artists and you can generate truly ghastly pieces of work.

The blurb to Dawn of the Mutants reads, “They looked like men but there was an uncanny difference — could they be controlled?” Who could possibly behold these poor, deformed, green-skinned creatures and not think, “My God! A mutant!”? The question that follows naturally is, “I wonder if they can be controlled? Are they cheaper than Mexicans?”

These are awful beyond the power of words to describe.

The Shadow had some fantastic covers, but this one is flat, lifeless, and the eyeball-kick is the Shadow’s oversized proboscis. Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow Nose.

Women’s magazines could be just as bad. The Good Housekeeping cover on the left is beautifully drawn, but nothing can compensate for the fact that it is a picture of a woman inspecting her glassware for smudges. Presumably the next month’s cover was the same lady beating her worthless maid, which would at least have been of interest to Tory Cabinet ministers. The National Magazine cover has no redeeming features whatsoever. How dull could a Christmas cover possibly get? An unexceptional face staring vacantly into the distance, with puffs of mistletoe coming out each ear. The lead story is “Odd Things of South Africa.” National Magazine answers the old theological argument: Yes, Virginia, there is Christmas in Purgatory.

There is nothing wrong with reinterpreting classic material, but if you’re going to recycle the Andromeda myth, it would be a good idea to replace the monstrous sea serpent with something even more terrifying instead of this Attack of the 50ft Green Woman with Bloodshot Eyes and Bushy Grey Eyebrows.

Next instalment: Ugly Pulp