The Secret to Writer’s Block: Misfit Inspiration
Guest Post by
Albert Seligman
The American Weekly Project
Let me start with an initial disclaimer. Unlike Heather and her subscribers, I am not a writer. I am a researcher and was an avid book collector. I collected illustrated books from the ‘Golden Age’, when photographic printing plates replaced woodcuts or chromolithographs. This made the Gift Book, with many color illustrations, popular and affordable around the beginning of the 20th century.
My main focus was Edmund Dulac, one of the Golden Age pioneers, who with Arthur Rackham, W.H. Robinson, Kay Nielsen and others provided lush watercolor illustrated versions of popular novels and many classics, especially Shakespeare and the Arabian Nights Tales.
I studied the Edmund Dulac biography by Colin White (1976, Scribner’s Sons) which contained an incomplete bibliography of Dulac’s books and a few of his many magazine illustrations.White listed the front covers he painted for The American Weekly, the Hearst Corporation Sunday Supplement. From 1924-1951 Dulac painted 106 covers for thirteen different series. This commission provided Dulac with work and income during the post war years, after the demand for gift books dried up. Only a few of these illustrations were ever republished in other magazines or books. I searched for a complete collection and was fortunate to find all the American Weeklys in the San Francisco Academy of Comic Art, owned by Bill Blackbeard.
Bill allowed us to remove and professionally photograph the covers. The photographer made 3”x4” transparencies which were used to make printing plates, this being 1995, years before digital photography was invented. Unfortunately, the cost of printing such a large full color art book put off potential publishers, so we had to shelve the project.
Recently, I discovered these transparencies could be digitally scanned for both eBooks and print editions. In 2021, I self-published The American Weekly Covers of Edmund Dulac 1924-1951 as an eBook, so Dulac and The American Weekly collectors would have the full collection available for research and enjoyment.
The design of the eBook was obvious; a short introduction of the project and presenting all thirteen series in chronological order. But there was much more material than just the Dulac illustrations. Beginning with the third series in 1929, “Famous Vamps of History”, each cover had a short story under the image, explaining who,what or where the cover was about.
The eBook was not easily readable, as was pointed out by one of my Amazon reviewers, himself an author and collector. The last three series’ all had longer stories, two written by American author and musician John Erskine, and the final 1951 series, The Arabian Nights, was written by Hearst staff writer Watson Crews Jr.
I had a few of the stories from issues in my own collection, but the rest I lacked. In order to publish a definitive edition of Dulac’s covers, I had to locate these stories. Bill Blackbeard passed away in 2011 and his collection was acquired by the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum at OSU. They had not completed cataloging his collection, but by the end of last year, had finished the Erskine stories. The New York Public Library has a B&W microfilm of The American Weeklys, and was able to send me the 1951 Arabian Nights Tales.
I now have four complete books from the collection. Seven Tales From King Arthur’s Court, 1940, was published this year by Markosia. 8 Canterbury Tales,1942, also with Erskine stories, will be published this fall. The Library Edition, including all the images, some original watercolors and the complete texts is ready for the 100th anniversary of the first series next year.
I imagine writing and research are similar. Outline what you want to include, research the subject material and present it to your readers in a logical sequence. Best of luck to all.
Want to learn more about The American Weekly?
On sale this month at Smashwords- https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1105433
Seven Tales From King Arthur’s Court – Markosia
Preview of The American Weekly Covers of Edmund Dulac 1924-1951 by Albert Seligman - Issuu
Bill Blackbeards collection at OSU- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3zkd0ZwHBo
The complete American Weekly collection in high resolution- https://www.alamy.com/portfolio/albertcscs
I hope that these ideas help you to break through!
Disclaimer: This post is exclusively the words and views of the guest blogger and do not necessarily represent the views of Heather L. Barksdale. The story featured has not been read or reviewed by Heather’s bookshelf.
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