Real Signature? (1 Viewer)

Yep, Yep5, that is a real Buk signature. Black Sparrow Press made it easy to verify when signatures are authenric. They have a lot of first issue points that make it damn near impossible to forge a signature in one of their limited edition numbered or lettered books.

That being said, Buk signed these sheets years before and this book came out shortly after he died, but the signature is authentic.

Bill
 
Yes real.

But Bill's answer is much better :)
 
I'm taking a stab in the dark here, and guessing that 'great_books_4U' isn't on this board, and therefore I'm not pissing him or her off by saying this. If I'm wrong, well, I can live with myself.

That being said, I think that

a) The $261 asking price on this copy is a little high. I got a signed Pulp on eBay last summer with the screenprint for about $220 or so. There are good copies of great books out there and you will find them, you just have to be patient. I did a quick 2-minute search and found the same book for $262 and $300, so while $261 is a fair price for a shop or online retailer, it is a little high for eBay. If you use the 'eBay should be 20% cheaper than a shop' (a very loose and completely unscientific rule), then you could fairly offer the seller $200-$220 and see what happens.

b) Personally, I think the signed Pulps are a little less desirable to have on the shelf than the earlier stuff, because it was done at the end and that creeps me out a little bit. I like the idea of Buk sitting down with a stack of firsts and a jug of wine to sign the limited editions, vs. 'Well you're going to be dead when Pulp hits the stands, sign 1000 sheets of paper, and we'll bind 'em in'.

Not saying this to dissuade you yep5, just pointing out that it's a buyer's market right now, so it's a little easier to make sure you get the book you want at the price you want.
 
Buk never signed the actual BSP or Loujon books. He always signed the sheets and they were later glued into the book. This is how it is usually done by most publishers as it is VERY expensive to send hundreds of books for signature..

Bill
 
for 3 or 4 hundred you can get a copy of Crucifix in a Deatthand, which is not only very early, but also one of the most beautifully bound Bukowski books ever. The art does nothign for me, but the damn thing is letterpress printed on beautiful deckled paper and all 3100 copies were signed, so you are assured of getting an authentic signed Bukowski at a bargain of a price.

Just have patience. They sold for as little as $125 a few years ago, but have gone up recently. If you can find one at $300, i would say to buy it as I cannot see them ever going lower than that again. This book has always been tragically underpriced, based solely on the 3100 copies, which was a HUGE amount then and even now, would take a while to sell....

http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=900938554&searchurl=an%3Dbukowski%26sts%3Dt%26tn%3Dcrucifix%26x%3D0%26y%3D

Bill
 
There are good copies of great books out there and you will find them, you just have to be patient.
That's true. There have been plenty of times I've waited a year for a better deal and found one. But "patient" sometimes means waiting 20 years, depending on the book and what you want to pay, and some people aren't that patient. Few people are.

And sometimes that year or two can also screw you if something goes up (see Bill's example of Crucifix above).

it's a buyer's market right now...
For the books, I can't really think of a time it was a seller's market.

To me, any signed Bukowski is good Bukowski. The older the better, sure, but honestly, signing books is pretty much always assembly line work. It's not really enjoyable, and Bukowski complained about it plenty. Sit down and write your name a hundred times. You'll be pretty sick of it by the 30th or 40th time you have to write it.
 
Good points, all. And yah, it's always assembly line work and all that -- though I had assumed Martin would just go to LA with a couple boxes for Buk to sign, but process wise they were all tipped in?

On the Crucifix, I've been waiting to find a modestly priced copy signed on my birthday (3-16) -- I've seen them, but that's one of the more expensive days for some damn reason.

MJP - I was a check-signer for the non profit I worked at, so every two weeks I'd sit down to sign a few hundred checks. It sucked, sure, but man, if I knew they were going into books that would've been a different story.
 
With the later editions, some contained signed editions of 500 or more copies. You cannot put 500 large hardcovers in the back of a car and drive them into LA. You would need a U-Haul and a couple strong movers to jockey the boxes. If you have an edition of 400 and can get 20 books in a box, that would be 20 heavy boxes. Probably 6oo or 700 lbs of books. Much easier to send him 2lbs of paper and have these pages put in the books. it also helps avoid the author screwing up and the publisher then being stuck with a perfectly bound book with a screwed up signature.

Bill
 
They weren't all tipped in. The last few signed editions had tipped-in signatures on a blank page after the title, but most of the BSP signed editions have signed colophons, which to me appear to be bound-in like any other page in the book.
 
They were all bound in or tipped in (if I even got my terminology correct). This is a book nerd point, but tipped in would be a single page glued onto a sewn signature, while bound in would be a single leaf (one page folded in half to make 4 printed pages,) sewn into other signatures in the text block. Again, it is something of a moot point as in the end, Bukowski was either signing roughly 8.5" x 5.5" blank pages, or 8.5" x 11" pages with a printed colophon, but no handwritten numbers or letters. These would then be returned to the publisher and he would send them off to the bookbinder.

I do not know if any of the Bukowski books were signed after the book was bound. Maybe some of the NYGs, as those are small enough. Maybe something like the 1/75 hardcover copies of AT TERROR STREET.
 
The Pulp signatures are all tipped in - glued as a single sheet into the first signature, after the color title page. I think there is at least one other book that uses those shaky later signature pages in the same way (according to Chronic's site, signed books were produced all the way up to 1998). Otherwise, yes, they were colophon signed, so he handled the entire 4 "page" sheet. But as far as I know, never the entire book. For the waste reason Bill cites (ruin a signature page, you ruin an entire book - ruin a colophon page, just crumple it up and throw it away), and the common sense reason that it's not a very efficient way to sign a lot of books. But who knows.
 
They were all bound in or tipped in (if I even got my terminology correct). This is a book nerd point, but tipped in would be a single page glued onto a sewn signature, while bound in would be a single leaf (one page folded in half to make 4 printed pages,) sewn into other signatures in the text block.

I don't consider that to be a book nerd point at all. The question posed was whether the signed pages were all tipped in. The correct answer is no, some were, and most weren't.

If 50% or more of the shit you see on the interwebby thang is bullshit, isn't there some impetus to embrace accuracy whenever possible?
 

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