[ROTH, Samuel] Hugh Wakem

The Diary of a Smut-Hound. A Crusader for Morality in Literature Supplies the World with a Valuable Insight into His LIfe and Habits

Philadelphia: William Hodgson [Samuel Roth], 1930. First Edition. Hardcover with Dust Jacket. 8vo. Pp. 63. Amber paper-covered boards with spine lettered in black. Dust jacket with some edgewear, otherwise a very attractive copy. Fine / Very Good. Item #5303

An important roman a clef providing a satiric view of censorship in New York City, and one of notorious pornographer Samuel Roth's thirty titles published under his William Faro imprint. (The William Hodgson imprint is another of Roth's; title page lists Hodgson but dust jacket states Faro.)

Here Roth skewers and facetiously assumes the identity of John Sumner, leader of the New York Society for the Prevention of Vice. Roth details, in disguise, the censor's 1929 raids on NYC booksellers, including Woolworth's, "Charles Rand" (Samuel Roth); "Bernard Mussler" (Jacob "Jack" Brussel); "Doris Stevens," et al. A charming piece of publishing's underbelly. Or is it nether region? Dust jacket is now preserved in a removable, clear archival sleeve.

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Price: $35.00