Recreations

There's an ebook publisher called Prologue Books, who do sterling work in resurrecting infamous and sometimes even very good pulp novels from (mainly), the 1940s to 1970s. Often their covers are the standard modern version of pulp covers--moody photos of men with guns, women reclining on beds, and shiny spaceships--but sometimes they've taken the slightly disconcerting step of recreating the original pulp cover images with modern technology. Somehow, mid-20th-Century sexploitation and sleaze looks wrong when rendered in clean digital photography and with sleek Photoshop filters. Here are some examples...

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The painted cover is a hell of a lot sexier (that naked back) and sinister than its photo(shopped) equivalent: the painted man above looks like a dangerous intruder, the photographed man below looks as though he's going out to buy milk after experiencing erectile dysfunction.

 

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Vin Packer was really Marijane Meaker, who was for a while the lover of Patricia Highsmith, and author of a disappointing memoir about their relationship.

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This fantastic cover by Robert Maguire just doesn't have the same kick redone photographically.