Cirrus@Austlit

'Horwitz Publications, Pulp Fiction and the Rise of the Australian Paperback is an informative, fascinating book focused on one of the main Australian publishers of the twentieth century, Horwitz Publications. Many of us lurking in the shadows, or it might be in the full sun, of Australian literary studies will know the name of Carter Brown, but few of us will know very much at all about his main Australian publisher, Horwitz, and its connections both in Australian book publishing and the international pulp fiction world. Horwitz Publications is a rare book in the Australian scene. Apart from works on Angus & Robertson (Jason Ensor, Jennifer Alison) and the New South Wales Bookstall Company (Carol Mills) there are very few book-length studies of specific publishing houses and their social or cultural contexts. There have been field-defining broader studies of publishing, such as Katherine Bode’s work, and critical essays, old and new, covering specific periods. But much remains scattered across these different works, even as new avenues and pathways for cultural history are revealed. My own essay on post-war Australian publishing and cultural politics in the 2009 Cambridge History of Australian Literature does mention Horwitz and other popular publishers as ‘the most active local publishers of new Australian novels’, but I also have to admit that these firms do not play a larger part in the essay’s arguments.'  (Introduction)