Pulp Magazine Cover

パルプ雑誌の表紙 / 1920s–1950s / Style / Publishing and Editing

Fiction magazines printed on cheap pulp paper competed on sensational covers. Melodramatic oil painting, the instant of peril and screaming logotypes cast the visual language of science fiction, horror and crime, which flowed on into paperbacks and comics.

Pulp Magazine Cover — Weird Tales, August 1930 issue — Wikimedia Commons / Public domain — Weird Tales, August 1930 issue — Wikimedia Commons / Public domain

Pulp Magazine Cover — Amazing Stories Quarterly, 1930 — Wikimedia Commons / Public domain — Amazing Stories Quarterly, 1930 — Wikimedia Commons / Public domain

Pulp Magazine Cover — Detective Book Magazine, Fall 1940 issue, cover by Allen Anderson — Wikimedia Commons / Public domain — Detective Book Magazine, Fall 1940 issue, cover by Allen Anderson — Wikimedia Commons / Public domain

At a glance

Visual cues

Melodramatic oil painting
The instant of peril
Screaming logotypes
Primary-color sensation

Best used for

Science fiction and horror jackets that must sell danger at a glance
Event or streaming promotion needing pulp elation and open sensation

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Dictionary entry

Type: The title screaming across the top, author and tagline on slanted bands
Composition: The instant of peril centered, painting run out to every edge
Material: Oil brushwork in primaries sinking into a yellowed, coarse ground
Caution: Painting sloppily to look cheap removes the rendering skill that carried the sensation and leaves fake old printing.
Further study: Margaret Brundage / Frank R. Paul / the inheritance into paperbacks and EC comics

Related entries

Circus Poster (サーカスポスター)Shared effects: Exhilaration / Play / Nostalgia.Compare Pulp Magazine Cover and Circus Poster
Pop Art (ポップアート)Shared effects: Exhilaration / Play.Compare Pulp Magazine Cover and Pop Art

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