For Men Only
Shapiro, Charles
OUR READERS—and Prof. Galbraith —may be interested in some sobering statistics which appeared in "Taxes and Living Costs vs: a Factory Worker's Pay check," Industrial Bulletin, New...
...But only recently has our wonderful world of literature also been organized along sexual lines...
...framed into a duel with France's arch killer...
...The feature male attraction is the complete text of Leslie Turner White's "headlong action and adventure novel" Monsieur Yankee, which is conveniently summarized by the editors: "Monsieur Yankee chooses a course of action which leads to his being mistaken for one of the most notorious of British spies...
...There are five parts to my copy of Reading-for-Men...
...PERHAPS Reading-for-Men is an obvious and predictable development for the book club industry which has featured organizations dealing out specialized volumes in Religion, History, Gardening, Antiques, Art, Mystery, Farming, Horses, Science, Miniatures, Taxes, and Yachts...
...The 1955-56 edition of Literary Market Place lists over 100 such clubs, my favorite being something billed as "The Pastoral Psychology Book Club...
...Presumably his career as logger exempts Holbrook from the effeminate traces he might have picked up at Harvard...
...Leslie Fiedler has charmingly demonstrated that Huck Finn, long the apotheosis of everyman's American boyhood, is open to more than polite suspicion...
...entangled with the seductive French informer, Ninon...
...He just couldn't wait...
...then, after minor things like food, rent, and clothing are taken care of, he can really go on a fling with his affluence...
...Quick dips into this swashbuckler bear out the accuracy of this description...
...The three club rules, no sissies allowed, are: 1. Each volume will contain 320 pages or more of real masculine reading—every month one full length new book and with it four or more generous extracts—no condensations— of other outstanding books to give you a broad insight into what American men are reading...
...Who, nowadays, can be absolutely certain of American writers that hide under male names...
...2. The all-male editorial board will pick books that they know rate high on the popularity polls...
...The base period used is 1947-49, two good years and a bad one...
...All we have to do is subscribe to Reading-for-Men, settle down with our Marlboros, and have a quiet evening of hair-on-the-chest reading...
...As an extra added attraction Reading-for Men offers selected jokes from Bennett Cerf's The Life of the Party...
...So why not a book club for men...
...The announcement of this change reached me in a letter from one John Hardy, advertising director for Nelson Doubleday, Inc., "the world's greatest book club organization...
...Disregarding inflation, he now has $74.84 to spend...
...Hardy was obviously excited, for in his form letter he burst out: "I am writing this note from my office late in the evening because I want to tell you at once about a great new idea in book publishing...
...Of the seven jokes devoted to Doctors, three are aimed in the direction of psychiatrists...
...Other male-directed features include excerpts from The Dog Who Wouldn't Be ("the warmhearted Best Seller about a Dog and his Boy") ; Low Level Mission ("One of the most worthwhile books to come out of World War II") ; and Stewart Holbrook's The Era of the Moguls, the author being hailed as "the only ex-lumberjack who has lectured at Harvard University on American history...
...The article deals with trends in the real spendable earnings— wages, after federal and state income and social security taxes, in constant dollars— of the average factory-production worker in the wealthiest state in the Union dur ing the past decade...
...Take off $14.19 in price rises, and he has left $60.65, in 1947-49 dollars to spend, compared to $53.66 in 1947-49...
...The article concludes: Hence, under the combined impact of taxes and prices, the single worker can buy only about thirteen per cent more goods and services at the end of the decade than at its beginning, and the married worker can buy about fifteen per cent more...
...I took Hardy at his word, and the first masculine volume arrived along with the request that you "tag along with us for a few months...
...You'll no longer waste time trying to find good reading entertainment— these are the "top" books discovered for you...
...And anyone who doesn't like it can go back to his knitting, his Henry James novels, his cream-puffs...
...Now, however, we can be assured about the manliness of our writers by a board of experts...
...Do you know...
...This leaves him with $53.64, in 1947-49 dollars, to spend, compared to $47.47 in 1947-49...
...Another $12.55 has been swallowed up by the twenty-three per cent rise in consumer prices...
...But we can wonder somewhat about affluence...
...Two major factors are considered: the rising tax burden and rising, consumer prices...
...Galbraith —may be interested in some sobering statistics which appeared in "Taxes and Living Costs vs: a Factory Worker's Pay check," Industrial Bulletin, New York State Department of Labor, February, 1959, pp...
...Mr...
...3. The books are to be handsomely designed, full library sized volumes that build up into a beautiful set...
...The yaks come from such sections as Animals, Automobiles, and Sports...
...and swept through a turbulent series of ad ventures that culminate in a spectacular sea chase and the explosion of the powderkeg of intrigue that characterized France in 1793...
...No, we cannot speak of the pauperization of the proletariat...
...The special features of this "sensational new series of books edited to meet the tastes and interests of American men today" are implicit in its name, "Reading-for-Men...
...Gross weekly wages rose from $55.31 in 1947-49 to $82.49 in 1958 (ten months), a rise of forty-nine per cent...
...The average worker with two kids, bringing home $60.65 in today's dollars, still has to pay union dues, disability-benefits insurance, group insurance, sales and other local taxes...
...After all, what really went on during that raft trip down the Mississippi...
...Maybe so, but I'm convinced that a whole lot of men in this country are going to welcome these books with open hands and say keep 'em coming...
...A. A. THE HIDDEN and unhidden persuaders of Madison Avenue have regularly presented the American Male with his very own products, untainted by a speck of effeminacy...
...Maybe you think we're nuts to make such a wide-open offer...
...He-men eat Wheaties, smoke cigarettes, bathe with soaps and douse themselves with deodorants, all of which emphasize their ruggedness ("Women say 'deodorant.' Men say 'Trig...
...Considering that the face amount of the average salary has increased about five per cent a year, it is not at all impressive to discover that the average worker's net purchasing power only has risen slightly more than one per cent a year...
...Disregarding inflation, he now has $66.19 to spend...
...The worker with three dependents: Average weekly tax liability rose from $1.65 to $7.65...
...Hardy, fool that he is, allowed me to splurge a nickel on a sample volume...
...But real spendable earnings — —? The single worker: Average weekly tax liability rose from $7.84 to $16.30...
...14-17...
Vol. 6 • April 1959 • No. 2
