The BURIED Book Club discussion

Hello,

I have spent the better part of almost two years diving deep into the life and work of Jazz Age poet and novelist, Maxwell Bodenheim (1892-1954). I initiated this with a blog that would provide a repository of various poems, essays, book reviews and letters found around the web. The reason why I regard him as buried, both as a writer and all of his work, which consists of 14 published novels and 10 volumes of verse. All of these are out-of-print (I'm not counting the public domain pirates that OCR books by the thousands and spit them back out, mistakes and all.). This means that all of his work, which for the most part were best sellers in their day, have all sank without a trace. Now, Bodenheim exists all over the internet as a tabloid sensation, because of his sensational, tragic life. By the Depression-era, Bodenheim was no longer the darling of the Jazz Age, but had come to be regarded as a has-been after a serious of scandals relating to deaths from suicidal wanna-be poets whom he rebuffed, a dabbling with Communism and his own caustic personality that turned away even his closest allies. Once regarded as a peer of T.S. Eliot, Conrad Aiken, Ezra Pound and others of that ilk, he had come to be regarded as a pest, provocateur and all-around bum. Bodenheim sank into alcoholism, homelessness and, eventually, he was murdered along with his third wife, Ruth Fagan, by a psychopathic dishwasher in February 1954. All of this and more is available on the Internet reflecting him merely as curious anecdote. However, Bodenheim was a singular author of the realist novel as well an Imagist poet before turning his hand addressing workers rights in the 1930s, to which his verse and fiction began to reflect these causes.

Following the blog, I began to contemplate writing something more substantial, which I am in the process of doing. On my own dime, I paid for copies of his letters to his first wife, Minna Shein from Columbia University, as well as a collection of letters to Ben Hecht. Of these, I am still torn between writing a biography or some creative nonfiction. Until then, I have taken a hand at retyping these novels into fresh digital files and issuing them back into the marketplace in order to resurrect Bodenheim and his work. The first was Bodenheim's first novel, Blackguard, which I appended a serious of essays, letters and book reviews t place the work in its proper historical context. The second is a book that is so scarce that one, to this day, cannot be tracked down by any dealer, eBay or even Abebooks. This novel, SIX A.M. was published by Liveright, Inc. in 1932 where it fell off the map without a trace as the Depression all but obliterated Bodenheim's legacy. I managed to acquire a very rare copy of the novel and typeset the whole novel and put it up for sale on Amazon in both softcover and Kindle format.

My blog devoted to Bodenheim is: https://hobohemiadotblog.wordpress.com

It is the ONLY place you will find this content displayed with such slavish devotion. I encourage you to check it out.

Note - I don't argue for the merits or demerits of this man's work, but only that he is not deserving of such neglect, not in his lifetime or thereafter.

Your diligence is a shining example to all unburiers! Thank you for this.

I second Nate D's sentiment. Pretty bloody fantastic! I'll be looking at picking up some of your work. Thanks.

Thanks for the interest! I'll let you know how it rolls out . . .

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/...

I have set up a Kickstarter to (hopefully) get the resurrection of Maxwell Bodenheim back into gear . . .

Paul wrote: "I have set up a Kickstarter to (hopefully) get the resurrection of Maxwell Bodenheim back into gear . . ."

I got mine in!

Thanks! Much appreciated! Max appreciates it too . . . ; )

I have just compiled much of the lost Maxwell Bodenheim essays and criticism, along with some of his poetry into a book I titled, "Isolated Wanderer: The Maxwell Bodenheim Reader." The link for the book for print and Kindle version is:

https://www.amazon.com/Isolated-Wande...

This was over two years in the making :o

Thanks for checking it out . . .