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Immortalia, an anthology of american ballads, sailors' songs, cowboy songs, college songs, parodies, limericks, and other humorous verses and doggerel now for the first time brought together in book form, "By A Gentleman About Town" [T. R. Smith?] ("...privately printed for subscribers, none is for general sale" 1927 [pirated edition from the 2nd printing 1928 edtion, c.1932. New York: Samuel Roth or, less likely, Philadelphia: Nathan Young and Robert Sterling].) 6" x 8.75", iii, 184 pp., hardbound no DJ, decorated paper boards, cloth on spine and corners, worn edges on boards, corners bumped, binding tight. Assumed to be edited by T. R. Smith (George Macy, editor of Poetica Erotica around the same time). This is the most influential and widely published/circulated collection of "bawdry". Most collections since borrow from it liberally. There is a heavy emphasis on limericks (103 to be exact). Included are poems/"doggerel" attributed to James Joyce and D.H. Lawrence. -
Ninety-Five Limericks | A Contribution to the Folk Lore of our Time | Collected and Edited by John Falmouth (The Limerick Press, Suffern, NY, 1932) 5"x7.25", unpaginated, tan cloth boards with red lettering and decorations, some soiling on boards, interior good, previous owner added a limerick about a young man from Calcutta in the end pages. Mr. Falmouth has a 6 page forward where he discusses the phallic nature of the limerick (with diagrams). A fun little book even though the profanity is exed out. -
Ninety-Five Limericks | A Contribution to the Folk Lore of our Time | Collected and Edited by John Falmouth (The Limerick Press, Suffern, NY, 1932) 5"x7.25", unpaginated, protected DJ over tan cloth boards with red lettering and decorations, tears and soiling to DJ, some soiling on boards, interior good, previous owner added a limerick about a young man from Calcutta in the end pages. Mr. Falmouth has a 6 page forward where he discusses the phallic nature of the limerick (with diagrams). A fun little book even though the profanity is exed out. -
Some Limericks: Collected for the use of Students, & ensplendour’d with Introduction, Geographical Index, and with Notes Explanatory and Critical, by Norman Douglas (Nicholson and Whitney, Boston, 1942 [most likely published in Paris by Maurice Girodias of Olympia Press, early 1950's, a reprint of the Obelisk Press edition of 1939], stated 616/1000 "printed by The Brownbent Press, Boston, Mass.") 5.5" x 8.25", 117pp, near fine condition, unlabeled soft covers, dust jacket slightly warn at top with paper label "Some Limericks", spine of dust jacket simply reads "poems". Norman Douglas is an English author best known for his 1917 novel, South Wind. However, this particular book of his is one of the most pirated books of it's kind. Unable to find a publisher willing to take it on, Douglas published it himself in 1928. It was published by Oblisk Press in 1939 (said to be the last book secured for the company before Jack Kahane's lifetime). This particular edition was published by Mr. Kahane's son, Maurice Girodias, who inherited his father's press, but changed the name to Olympia Press. It is said that this book has everything, blasphemy, incest, paedophilia, bestiality. Accompanying each limericks are entertaining (if not scholarly) notes explaining the supposed origin and/or circumstances by which the rhymes were procured. So obscene and offensive, even Olympia Press, known for it's erotic literature, chose to publish under a false imprint. -
The Limerick, a facet of our culture, anonymous [A. Reynolds Morse] ( Cruciform Press, Mexico City: Privately Printed for Private Circulation to Subscribers Only, 1944 [Cleveland, Ohio: A. Reynolds Morse, 1948.] #208/250) 8" X 5.5", vii+157pp. Hardbound, black cloth boards, gilt lettering on cover. near fine condition (rare for this edition!), slight rust around staples. A. Reynolds Morse was an American, born in 1914, who died in 2000. He moved to Cleveland from Denver in 1941. An industrialist and philanthropist, he is best known for his activity in collecting works by Salvador Dali, and founding the Salvador Dali Museum. According to his obituary in the New York Times, Reynolds and his wife "embarked on a sometimes turbulent friendship with Dali and his wife, Gala". He also had a hobby of collecting and publishing works that other publishers would not print. Title page: "A study of the history and development of the limerick, ensplendor'd with over two hundred examples of the immortal verse form, commentaries, and index" This book is considered by most to be the "dirtiest" collection of limericks. Mr. Morse also published "Folk Poems and Ballads An Anthology". Both books were suppressed by police action in the late 1940's. This is a VERY rare near fine copy of this hard-to-find book. It was poorly made so most of the copies out there have signatures loose. -
Ed. G. Legman (Bell Publishing Company, New York, 1944) 9.25" X 6", 517pp, hardcover, green boards, no DJ, fair condition, title page detached.