Librorum ridiculorum a c.., p.1
Librorum Ridiculorum: a Compendium of Bizarre Books, page 1
COPYRIGHT
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First published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2022
FIRST EDITION
© Brian Lake 2022
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Source ISBN: 9780008545543
Ebook Edition © October 2022 ISBN: 9780008545567
Version 2022-09-22
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Page numbers taken from the following print edition: ISBN 9780008545543
CONTENTS
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Note to Readers
Introduction
LIST OF AUTHORS
Allin, Russell V.
Baker, Dorothy
Bent, Superintendent James
Bolton, John Adams
Branson, J.R.B.
Brewster, Francis Wentworth, of Trinity College, Cambridge
Broel, Dr Albert
Bueno De Mesquita, Irene
Carr, Frank
Coblentz, Stanton A.
Davies, J. Gwynoro
De Burgh, Beatrix M.
Dobson, Charles
Doner, Thomas
Dugmore, Major A. Radclyffe
Dull, Raymond W.
Eden, Charles Henry
Flood, Gerald Maurice
Frolov, Yuri Petrovich
Gale, John
Giles, George W. and Osborn, Fred M.
Guiney, J.P.
Hall, Marion
Hamilton-Gordon, John Campbell, 1st Marquess of Aberdeen and Temair
Handy, Etta H.
Hardy, Edward John
Hipkiss, James
Hou, Min and Yutong, Lin
Kitley, Alan T.
(Leech, Joseph) ‘The Moist Man’
Liverpool Screw Towing Company
Lust, Benedict
Macfadden, Bernarr
Malan, Arthur Noel
Manhood, Harold Alfred
Midgley, Wilson
National Temperance League
Peyton, K.M.
Plunket, Ierne Lifford
Prout, Geoffrey
Prout, Samuel Gillespie
Radiation Cookers
Renier, Gustaaf Johannes
Richards, Phil and Banigan, John J.
Robertson, Wilfrid
Rostron, Lewis
Rox, Henry and Fisher, Margaret (pseudonym of Grete Fischer)
Rutley, Cecil Bernard
Science Service
Scott, George R.
Sinclair, Upton
Stock, Eugene
Swift, Jonathan
Tebb, William and Vollum, Edward Perry
Topham, Frank
Van Den Berghs & Jurgens Ltd
Warne, Frederick
Windt, Harry de
Wray, J. Jackson
Wright, Henry C.
Wright, John James
Acknowledgements
About the Publisher
INTRODUCTION
I am very pleased to offer a selection of the best Ridiculous Books from the Bizarre Library – but at the same time sorry to say ‘I’ rather than ‘we’, as previous compilations of Bizarre Book titles were jointly selected with Russell Ash, who is sadly no longer with us.
As an antiquarian bookseller, I had started collecting odd and unusual titles – which had to be genuine, not concocted – after organising with Peter Miller a Provincial Booksellers Fairs Association exhibition in York back in 1982. And it was Peter Miller who put me in touch with Russell after an overheard conversation in a Mayfair bookshop suggested we had a shared interest.
Frog Raising for Pleasure and Profit was published in 1985 with contributions from librarians and all branches of the book trade – including a sheaf of ‘index cards’ titled Clippings Together by Brian Staples. Compiling the book was, quite simply, the best fun possible out of bed!
When we started, there was no instant checking on the internet – visits to the British Library were necessary to make sure that the books actually existed and their bibliographical details were correct. It is much easier now – and for collectors of odd titles, at least some living examples can be found by searching websites such as viaLibri.
On the back cover of Frog Raising, the authors were photographed ‘browsing among the shelves … of the Bibliotheca Bizarrica, Lytham St Annes’. Many times we have been asked for the address of this mythical library … It does exist now, even though the books mainly lie in boxes I’m sorry to say, but with a selection on display, at Jarndyce Antiquarian Booksellers, 46 Great Russell Street (opp. British Museum), London WC1B 3PA – and see our Bizarre Book cards by visiting www.jarndyce.co.uk.
Brian Lake
ALLIN, Russell V.
TITLE
The Resistance of Piles to Penetration.
PUBLISHER
E. & F.N. Spon. 1935. Pink cloth. Dust jacket.
COMMENTS
Advocating use of ‘the heavier hammer with the smaller drop’ – enough to make anyone wince who has suffered from haemorrhoids, but highly useful for the structural engineer.
BAKER, Dorothy.
TITLE
Young Man with a Horn.
PUBLISHER
Readers Union and Victor Gollancz. 1939. Blue cloth.
COMMENTS
This is the story of Rick Martin, a young man who ‘earned enough money to buy himself a horn. And then he learned to play … [and] if there’s anybody here who doesn’t know what kind of a horn a horn is … it’s a trumpet.’
BENT, Superintendent James.
TITLE
Criminal Life: Reminiscences of Forty-Two Years as a Police Officer.
PUBLISHER
Manchester: John Heywood. 1891. Frontispiece portrait. Brown cloth.
COMMENTS
A classic case of ‘the wrong name for the job’. Starting his working life at the age of seven in an Eccles silk mill, James Bent joined the Preston, Lancashire, police force in 1848, rising through second-class constable, inspector and eventually being appointed superintendent in Manchester. The term ‘bent copper’ had fortunately not yet been invented, but James did receive an anonymous letter in May 1884 ‘making imputations and aspersions’ against his character. His colleagues responded by refuting the ‘foul sentiments’ and expressing ‘utter abhorrence of the dastardly conduct of the writer’.
BOLTON, John Adams.
TITLE
Arresting Disclosures: A report on the strange findings in undergarments washed with soap and water, and popularly supposed to be clean and wholesome.
PUBLISHER
Leicester: J. & J. H. Vice. 1925. ‘Over 130 micro-photographs’. Brown boards.
COMMENTS
A rather unpleasant exploration of dirty underwear, indicating the continuing presence of fungi, spores, germs, worms and other organisms that survive a wash with soap. ‘The book is priced at 2/6d, but is gratis to wearers of “Chilprufe” underwear.’ The reader expects Mr Bolton to conclude by offering his own, patented, alternative to soap, but he only makes arresting disclosures without providing a solution.
BRANSON, J.R.B.
TITLE
Recipes for Grass.
PUBLISHER
3rd edition. Balham Hill: Branson’s Publications. 1943. Pamphlet bound into green cloth.
COMMENTS
Two other pamphlets by Mr Branson are recorded: Grass for All: A new diet (1939) and Eating for Victory (1940), but this book of grass recipes has escaped the clutches of any other library.
The copy in the Bibliotheca Bizarrica has been tastefully bound into suitable green cloth, suggesting the contents might provide recipes for cannabis cakes or biscuits. Not so.
Mr Branson is an advocate of eating the green stuff – ‘personally I use freshly mown grass when I can get it … if long, it needs to be chopped for comfortable masticatio
BREWSTER, Francis Wentworth, of Trinity College, Cambridge.
TITLE
How to Avoid Being Drowned; or, All about flotation.
PUBLISHER
Roberts & Leete. 1885. Illustrations. Blue cloth.
COMMENTS
Brewster (1847–1908) went on to become one of the founders of the Buoyant Appliances Supply Co. in 1890, and registered patents for screw propellers and improving armour plating for ships, as well as a diversion into golf balls. This guide to keeping afloat should be read in conjunction with Richards and Banigan’s How to Abandon Ship (q.v.). It concludes with ‘Directions for Restoring the Apparently Dead’.
BROEL, Dr Albert.
TITLE
Frog Raising for Pleasure and Profit.
PUBLISHER
New Orleans: Marlboro House. 1950. Illustrations. Green cloth.
COMMENTS
Editions were published between 1943 and 1960. A classic bizarre book, which opens to the delightful photograph of an attractive ‘Young Lady’ holding male and female bullfrogs. Farming frogs the Broel way fills most of the book; it concludes with numerous recipes – ‘Famous ways to serve giant frogs’ – which include Giant Frog Gumbo, Jellied Giant Bullfrog Creamed Salad, Hot Giant Bullfrog Sandwiches and Baked Apples Stuffed with Giant Bullfrog meat.
BUENO DE MESQUITA, Irene.
TITLE
Men Are Pigs.
PUBLISHER
Cecil Palmer. 1927. Grey-green boards.
COMMENTS
Dedicated to ‘All the men I have ever met – except one’, this is a collection of anti-male aphorisms, including:
‘What are men – husbands in particular – but Pigs! Pigs! Pigs!’
‘A woman has for a man the same attraction that a bargain sale has for a woman. There is always the hope of getting something for nothing.’
‘Every man has some vice. Some are cruel, some are unfaithful, and some are fat.’
‘Men force women to play a losing game, where the odds are all against them, and the prize is worthless.’
‘Men spend their lives idealising women in theory and abusing them in practice.’
Bueno de Mesquita also wrote Lady – This Love! (1931).
CARR, Frank.
TITLE
Tosser, Gunman.
PUBLISHER
Ward, Lock. 1939. Green cloth. Dust jacket.
COMMENTS
A classic Western novel: ‘“Gee if it ain’t Tosser Smith. What are you doing in this neck of the country?” The cook stiffened as through his brain flashed the recollection of his recent attitude towards his visitor. His mouth became curiously dry. Tosser Smith, gunman, killer, outlaw. He’d heard tell that he had killed more men than any other gunman … Betty’s fingers gripped her quirt tightly … she, too, had heard of Tosser Smith …’
COBLENTZ, Stanton A.
TITLE
Planet of the Knob Heads.
‘Astounding new book length novel’ in Science Fiction, December 1939.
PUBLISHER
Atlas Publishing. 1939. Illustrations. Wrappers.
COMMENTS
Jack and Marjorie encounter the knob heads from Andromeda on a tropical island
‘Hot! By my knob, what an idea!’
‘Who could deny what you ask, O noble-knobbed lady?’
‘Must the High Knobule give permission for our knobulation?’
‘She was not easily to be pleased. One knob was too small, and one was too large … one had a spot, and one was too bony.’
‘Willingly shall I go, oh Luminous Knob!’
Jack and Marjorie purchase their escape by promising to return with more ‘smoke-sticks’.
DAVIES, J. Gwynoro.
TITLE
Flashes from the Welsh Pulpit.
PUBLISHER
Hodder & Stoughton. 1889. Blue cloth.
COMMENTS
‘It is to be hoped that these Flashes have retained sufficient heat to warm some Christian’s heart, and sufficient light to illumine the path of some wanderer who is far from home …’
‘What is the class of literature perused by our young people? Is it that which stimulates thought, purifies the taste, makes tender the conscience, and sanctifies the heart? I fear it is not, but rather the class that tends to influence the passions while it lulls the moral sensibilities into a deep sleep.’
Guilty as charged.
DE BURGH, Beatrix M.
TITLE
Drummer Dick’s Discharge.
PUBLISHER
London: Ernest Nister; New York: E.P. Dutton. 1902. Illustrations by E. Stuart Hardy. Brown cloth.
COMMENTS
An orphan is signed up from the workhouse to the army as ‘Richard Dick’ at the tender age of 14. Before Miss Aileen can buy him out, Dick discharges himself from the army by being shot – rallying the troop with his drum and dying a hero.
DOBSON, Charles.
TITLE
The History of the Concrete Roofing Tile: Its origins and development in Germany.
PUBLISHER
B.T. Batsford. 1959. Illustrations. Red cloth. Dust jacket.
COMMENTS
The author was a director of the Roofing Department of Messrs Hall & Co., Ltd and wrote several books on slating and tiling; this is probably his most obscure title. The concrete tile originated with Adolph Kroher in the 1850s.
DONER, Thomas.
TITLE
Eleven Years a Drunkard: The life of Thomas Doner. Having lost both arms through intemperance, he wrote this book with his teeth as a warning to others.
PUBLISHER
Sycamore, Illinois: Arnold Brothers. 1878. Wrappers.
COMMENTS
A salutary autobiography. ‘The evils of intemperance as evidenced in the thrilling experience’ of the author who has found himself armless as a result of overindulgence in whisky (and/or whiskey, as Mr Doner uses both spellings) and rum. Doner survives an attempted hanging and a stabbing before both arms are amputated after being ‘mangled’ by the wheels of a train on his way to Chicago, leaving him no longer legless, but armless. The back-cover advertisement is for the excellent services of the Chicago and North-Western Railway.
