News Release

2002-14

Trashy Tabloids or Literary Treasures?
Exciting new show at the National Library of Canada

(Ottawa July 11, 2002)  -  A unique and colourful new show officially opened today at the National Library of Canada highlighting the recently acquired collections of "pulp fiction" or popular literature printed in Canada in the 1940s and 1950s. The show entitled Sensational Stories: Pulp Literature at the National Library of Canada features a stunning variety of English and French detective, romance, spy, science fiction and western magazines as well as original commercial artwork and manuscript material.

While Canada was celebrating literary giants such as Gabrielle Roy, Irving Layton and W.O. Mitchell, a flourishing homegrown publishing industry, catering to a different readership, was already in full swing. "Pulp" magazines, costing mere pennies, filled Canadian newsstands and mailboxes with a steady supply of popular reading material on untrimmed cheap pulpwood paper stock in contrast to glossy pictorial periodicals. Because their activities were considered on the margins of literary production in Canada, most "pulp fiction" publishers did not keep their printed and production materials.

"This diverse range of magazines and paperbooks, complemented by the behind-the-covers production materials and other archival documentation, creates an absolutely priceless opportunity to study Canada's emerging publishing industry," said Rare Book Historian Michel Brisebois, who acquired the pulp literature materials for the National Library of Canada.

Titles such as Daring Confessions ("I was a Burlesque Queen, Madness Possessed Me!") to spy sensation L’Agent IXE-13 and Special Detective Cases ("Crimson Trail of the Society Slayer") are some examples of the issues featured in the show.

"Drawn from real life cases, pulp literature was both a mirror of contemporary society attitudes, and extreme and distorted departure from them," adds Melissa Rombout, Curator of the exhibit.

Rendered virtually obsolete with the advent of television, the sensational elements of these publications are recognizable today in the popularity of tabloid television and newspapers, romance paperback novels, low-budget horror films and interactive video entertainment.

The National Library of Canada is a federal cultural institution whose main role is to acquire, protect and promote Canada’s published heritage for all Canadians, both now and in the years to come. The Library serves as one of the nation’s foremost centres for research in Canadian Studies and as a showcase for Canadian literature and music.

Sensational Stories: Pulp Literature at the National Library of Canada is open until January 2003 from 9 a.m. to 10:30 pm. in Exhibit Room A at the National Library. Admission is free of charge.

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Information:

Pauline M. Portelance
Media Relations Officer
National Library of Canada
613-996-6128 or 613-293-4298