Kevin I. Slaughter » Bibliophile

“I LEARN SOMETHING ABOUT SEX” By Corey Ford (from “Tales for Males”)

Kevin I. Slaughter — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 19:39:50 +0000

A short story from a book I scanned the table of contents from earlier. It was worth the trouble just so I could get the following excerpt online, but the introductory paragraph is a gem that I’m going to post on my quotes page:

“I was weak as a baby when I was born, and indeed it was several weeks at sea before I was able to hoist a sail as well as the rest of the crew.

——————————————-

I LEARN SOMETHING ABOUT SEX

By Corey Ford

“You see this here fish, June?” old Britches asked me one afternoon. “This here fish is called a sucker. It’s called sucker because it will swallow almost anything. There’s hundreds of thousands of these suckers, June, and most of them read travel books.”
I never forgot the lesson that he taught me.
My life at sea started at a very tender age. In fact my first impression upon opening my eyes on the world was of being dangled unceremoniously upside down by the heels, while the family doctor spanked me repeatedly with his open palm. It seemed to me even then that this spanking business was starting pretty early, and I objected in my childish treble.
“Hey, what the hell?” I piped.
“Rockaby, baby,” replied the doctor kindly, seizing my ankles and slamming me against the mattress until I was red in the face.
“Listen, no damned son of a — can get away with that!” I gasped, my father’s blood roaring in my veins. “Rockaby, baby, eh!” and wrenching loose a slat from the cradle I swung on him with all my strength. Two hours later I reported aboard the Ethel M. Dell with my duffle wrapped up in a triangular piece of white linen.
I was weak as a baby when I was born, and indeed it was several weeks at sea before I was able to hoist a sail as well as the rest of the crew. In the meantime my father turned me over to the care of old Britches. Britches was the sail-maker on our boat—that is, when the wind fell off and we were becalmed, it was old Britches that Father called on to make sail—and from the time he first took charge of me until he perished in the fatal fire that finally destroyed our boat, he devoted his life to my care. For fourteen years he taught me the mysteries of the sea; and although I abused him and pestered him and embarrassed him as only a child can, yet everything that I am today I owe to him. Poor old Britches!
I recall Britches as the only man who was older than Father. His life was just one more of those mysteries of the sea. Nobody knew where he came from—some said he was a descendant of Robert Britches, the poet—but when he and his brother came aboard to sign on the Ship’s Articles, he fiddled with the pen for a moment and then said : “Our father’s name was Britches, Skipper, and if you don’t mind we’ll just sign on the same way.”
“Just a couple of sons of Britches,” answered Father, who knew a good joke when he saw one.
So the old sailor signed the Articles just “Britches,”1 and for fifteen years he went by no other name. In appearance he was unlike any other sailor I ever saw, an effect which was partially caused by the fact that he always wore a derby hat and carried a riding-crop. To discreet inquiries as to the purpose of these articles, he would only reply: “You never can tell when you might find a horse,” but it was generally believed that they referred to some romance of his buried past, and that in his youth he might have been thrown by a favorite mount. Whatever was his secret, Britches never told. He had a pleasant face surrounded by a fringe of red hair, and a wide comfortable lap, which did not disappear when he stood up, as most laps do, but merely ran around behind him and showed up under an assumed name. I spent many happy hours in that lap, learning some of the mysteries of the sea.
The first mystery which had to be solved was the question of feeding and clothing me during that initial trip. Fortunately the question of clothes was settled with promptness and dispatch. Britches had a pair of yellow oilskins and an old sou’ wester, which he had worn, man and boy, for fifty years and by which he set great store; but when the question of clothing me arose, he did not let any sentimental attachment deter him for a moment in his decision. Without hesitation the loyal old sailor grasped his scissors and with trembling fingers cut out the seat of a pair of father’s best pants. Soon I was clothed as shipshape and tidy as Britches and all the rest of the crew, except Father. For fourteen years old Britches was my guardian, nurse and severest critic, and no sacrifice was ever too great for his faithful old heart to make.
Although the question of clothing me was easily settled, the puzzle of how to feed me did not prove such an easy matter. Father’s friends had warned him that he was crazy to take a baby to sea; and their dire predictions seemed about to be borne out. Even old Britches was baffled. To be sure, he manufactured me a very handy milk-bottle out of an old gin bottle that Father had lying around in his bunk, half full; and he also designed a workable nipple out of the first mate’s galoshes. But when it came to filling the bottle, his ingenuity gave out.
Three days out of Frisco the supply of milk which Father had put aboard for me was exhausted, and we were forced to turn back and get more. This supply in turn was exhausted three days out, and Father had to turn back once more. The third time he got as far as four days out, but inasmuch as it took him just that much longer to get back to Frisco again, it really didn’t help much. After this state of affairs had continued for a month or so, Father grew pretty discouraged. It began to look as though we would never get more than three days out of Frisco until I was weaned.
“We’ve got to do something pretty soon,” he said disconsolately to Britches. “We’re way behind schedule, and our milk bill is getting something fierce.”
“Can’t we get milk from the ship?” suggested Britches. “A ship is she,” he added philosophically.
Father shook his head.
“We could milk her rudder,” urged Britches.
“How do you know?”
“I heard a farmer say so once.”
“You misunderstood.”
There was a long silence.
“If we had some cream,” said Britches, “we could add some water, and make milk out of that.”
There was another long silence. When Britches opened his eyes again, Father had left.
The following morning I was crying with hunger, and in desperation Father turned in at Norfolk Island to see if he could buy something for me to eat. He sent Britches in one direction down the island, and he went another, seeking to solve this feeding problem. His search was in vain. The native women refused to accompany him back to the ship—after all, they said, if he was so darned anxious for them he could come ashore—and after combing the island all day Father returned that night discouraged and empty-handed. Britches met him at the gangplank with a broad smile on his round face.
“Cap’n, I settled the feed problem fer the kid!”
“Where is it?” shouted Father.
With a sly grin Britches laid his finger astride his nose, tiptoed aft to the fo’c'stle, and pointed proudly to his prize. Father peered through the shadows, and saw a terrified goat tied to one of the bunks, balancing dizzily on its legs and bleating feebly.
“Cap’n, I hada helluva time gettin’ it,” said Britches, “but I finally traded your compass, sextant, and chronometer for this here dairy.”
It was the best trade Britches ever made. Father was so grateful for the goat that he gave Britches the special privilege of cleaning up after it, as long as it stayed on the ship. The happy sailors named the goat “Sweetheart,” and it soon became the pet of the fo’c'stle.
Unfortunately I was not destined to have my bottle of milk that night, nor for many nights to come. The moment we put to sea “Sweetheart” became violently seasick, and meantime I grew hungrier and hungrier. Father knew that seasickness, like a broken leg, was purely mental; but unfortunately neither the goat nor I fully appreciated this advice. For weeks it lay in its bunk in the fo’c'stle, moaning and groaning and hoping to itself that the boat would sink; and for weeks I lay in my bunk, starving to death. The crew tended the goat day and night, bringing it appetizing tidbits and magazines to read; but despite their efforts “Sweet‑heart” steadily refused to give milk. After a month had passed, Father’s suspicions began to be aroused. He decided to go aft to investigate.
That night he approached my bunk with a steaming platter of goat-meat.
“I’m afraid there’s no use waiting any longer for that milk,” he said sadly.
“Why not?” I demanded in surprise.
” ‘Sweetheart’ will never give milk, June, little girl.”
“What’s the big idea?”
By way of answer Father sat down quietly on the bunk beside me; and while I devoured my first square meal he opened his worn old Bible and turned its pages till he found a certain chapter in the Old Testament called the “Songs of Solomon.” And then in a gentle voice, while the ship creaked and the waves hissed under our bow, he read to me the explanation of the question that I had asked.
That was the first time I ever realized there was such a thing as Sex.

1 His brother left the ship immediately afterwards, having come aboard, in fact, just for the sake of the gag.

COREY FORD
A product of New York by birth and education, he has not limited his range of living and writing. His latest book “War Below Zero,” coauthored with Bernt Balchen, tells the story of Greenland. He also wrote “Short Cut to Tokyo.” It is amazing that the same man can write such incredibly ridiculous themes as the one we selected here. Sometimes he uses the pen name of John Riddell.
Corey Ford is widely known for fiction and satire which he contributes to magazines, and for his books such as “The Gazelle’s Ears.” He can give you serious reading which makes you think, or the most delicious nonsense which makes you chuckle. The latter applies to “1 Learn Something About Sex.”

His wikipedia page is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corey_Ford

BOOK NERD :: The Book of Forbidden Knowledge – free ebook on archive.org, + process notes

Kevin I. Slaughter — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 17:22:19 +0000

I uploaded my first contribution to archive.org today. A reader of my site from Germany asked if I had copies of “The Book of Forbidden Knowledge”, I assume after seeing it listed on the page with cover scans (actually photos) of various Johnson smith & Company booklets I have collected over the years.

I told her I’d scan my copy and send a PDF, but since I’d been finding so much incredible stuff on Archive.org lately I decided to upload it there so that everyone could have a digital copy if they wanted.

I figured I’d roughly outline my process with a few images:

I scan ever page individually at 400dpi in 24bit color. I have scanned them 2-up before, but the time saved at the scanner is lost in separating the images of the two pages in editing. For ease I just flip the book upside down ever other page so that I lay it on the platen in the same spot every time:

This means that every other page is upside down, but not a problem. I set the scanning area to be a bit larger than needed, so that if I don’t place it exactly in the same spot, I don’t end up cutting off something I need.

Once I have the scans, I import them all into photoshop and use the cropping tool to get the bulk of the text block with a little extra. You can rotate the area you crop to help straighten it out. From there I just click Image>Image Rotation>180 and it’s right side up.

I save each page with the correct page number, the above being ForbiddenKnowledge-pg01.tif, and the covers will get a -C1 for front, -C2 inside front, -C3 inside back, -C4 back.

I then open one image and create a Photoshop Action that strips the yellow paper color from the page (Image>Adjustments>Replace Color) and then use the curves to give the page a crisp dark black and white (Image>Adjustments>Curves) and finally convert to Grayscale. I close that image without saving and then use the Batch command with the new Action to zip through the directory of interior page images.

After this is done, I put them all into an InDesign file and exported to a PDF without compressing the images. I uploaded that PDF to Archive.org and it had automagically processed it before I was able to finish writing this blog, allowing me to put the following inline:

I started scanning this 36 page booklet at 11:20 this morning and posted the blog at about 1:20pm.

Quotes from “Studies in Pessimism” by Arthur Schopenhauer

Kevin I. Slaughter — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 18:55:23 +0000

Below are just a few quotes that I had highlighted on my Kindle when reading portions of “Studies in Pessimism”. I haven’t finished the book, but thought I’d share these quotes:

——-

“Hatred and contempt are diametrically opposed and mutually exclusive. There are even not a few cases where hatred of a person is rooted in nothing but forced esteem for his qualities. And besides, if a man sets out to hate all the miserable creatures he meets, he will not have much energy left for anything else ; whereas he can despise them, one and all, with the greatest ease. True, genuine contempt is just the reverse of true, genuine pride; it keeps quite quiet and gives no sign of its existence. For if a man shows that he despises you, he signifies at least this much regard for you, that he wants to let you know how little he appreciates you; and his wish is dictated by hatred, which cannot exist with real contempt. On the contrary, if it is genuine, it is simply the conviction that the object of it is a man of no value at all. Contempt is not incompatible with indulgent and kindly treatment, and for the sake of one’s own peace and safety this should not be omitted; it will prevent irritation ; and there is no one who cannot do harm if he is roused to it. But if this pure, cold, sincere contempt ever shows itself, it will be met with the most truculent hatred; for the despised person is not in a position to fight contempt with its own weapons.”

==========

“Why is it that common is an expression of contempt ? and that uncommon, extraordinary, distinguished, denote approbation ? Why is everything that is common contemptible ? Common in its original meaning denotes that which is peculiar to all men. i.e., shared equally by the whole species, and therefore an inherent part of its nature. Accordingly, if an individual possesses no qualities beyond those which attach to mankind in general, he is a common man.”

==========

“What value can a creature have that is not a whit different from millions of its kind ? Millions, do I say ? nay, an infinitude of creatures which, century after century, in never-ending flow, Nature sends bubbling up from her inexhaustible springs; as generous with them as the smith with the useless sparks that fly around his anvil.”

==========

“I have argued that whilst a lower animal possesses nothing more than the generic character of its species man is the only being which can lay claim to possess an individual character. But in most men this individual character comes to very little in reality; and they may be almost all ranged under certain classes: ce sont des especes. Their thoughts and desires, like their faces, are those of the species, or, at any rate, those of the class to which they belong; and accordingly they are of a trivial, every-day, common character, and exist by the thousand. You can usually tell beforehand what they are likely to do and say. They have no special stamp or mark to distinguish them ; they are like manufactured goods, all of a piece.”

—–

Also, I kinda dig this quote from Oswald Spengler:

For I confess that I have never had anything but contempt for ‘philosophy for its own sake.’ To my way of thinking there is nothing more tedious than pure logic, scientific psychology, general ethics and esthetics. Life is not made up of science and generalities. Every line that is not written in the service of active living seems to me superfluous. At the risk of being taken too literally, I would say that my way of looking at the world is related to the ‘systematic’ way as the memoirs of a statesman are related to the ideal state of a Utopian. The former writes down what he has lived through; the latter records what he has dreamed up.

BOOK NERD :: “The Traitor” by Thomas Dixon Jr. – Cover and Illustrations – Reconstruction Trilogy 3 of 3

Kevin I. Slaughter — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 04:13:04 +0000

Go to the first book in the Reconstruction Trilogy, “The Leopard’s Spots”
Go to the second book “The Clansman”

BOOK NERD :: “The Clansman” by Thomas Dixon Jr. – Cover and Illustrations – Reconstruction Trilogy 2 of 3

Kevin I. Slaughter — Sun, 18 Sep 2011 15:04:06 +0000

Go to the first book in the Reconstruction Trilogy, “The Leopard’s Spots”
Go to the third book “The Traitor”

The scans below are from a later edition, as it includes illustrations from the 1915 ~~film~~ .. ahem… photo-play, Birth of a Nation. The original illustrations can be found here.

BOOK NERD :: “The Leopard’s Spots” by Thomas Dixon Jr. – Cover and Illustrations – Reconstruction Trilogy 1 of 3

Kevin I. Slaughter — Sun, 18 Sep 2011 01:50:00 +0000

I’m posting a series of blogs featuring scans of the cover, title page and illustrations from three old Southern novels that constitute what the author called “The Reconstruction Trilogy”. Thomas Dixon Jr. (January 11, 1864 – April 3, 1946) was born in Shelby, North Carolina, about 2 hours southwest from where I was born and raised. He, like one of my own relatives, served in state government, but his time was short. He quit due to rampant corruption and referred to politicians as ”the prostitutes of the masses.”

I have not read this trilogy, and actually own quite a few of his novels (10 plus 2 duplicates of different printings), but have only recently begun reading his work starting with his anti-communist book “Comrades” (1909).

The Reconstruction Trilogy is composed of three novels:

The Leopard’s Spots (1902)
The Clansman (1905)
The Traitor (1907)

It was the second book in the series that inspired the D.W. Griffith film The Birth of a Nation (1915).

A number of his novels are available at Project Gutenberg, and a seemingly greater number at archive.org (though that might just be because there are so many duplicates).

Below are scans from the 1902 edition:

Below are scans of the cover and title page from the 1903 edition. It is missing the illustrations ”The Hon. Tim Shelby” and “It was Dick!” for reasons unknown to me. It includes a “Historical Note” that the other did not.

Go to the second book in the Reconstruction Trilogy, “The Clansman”
Go to the third book “The Traitor”

BOOK NERD :: Stories for Men / Tales for Males – Contents

Kevin I. Slaughter — Fri, 19 Aug 2011 04:11:40 +0000

I’ve posted these books before, but wanted to make an entry for the tables of contents for each, in case there’s someone who is searching for works by one of the authors. I’m posting photos of the contents now, but will transcribe them later so search engines can find the text. Also, as mentioned before, I’ve seen an ad for “Tales for Males” in one of my old men’s magazines, so I’ll scan that and put it here as well.

Acknowledgments
Introduction
Romance lingers, adventure lives / John Collier
Courtship through the ages / James Thurber
The girl in the storm / James M. Cain
Love, or, How to woo and win a woman / Jack Goodman and Alan Green
There are smiles / Ring Lardner
What goes on in ladies rest rooms / C.A. Hamilton
Helen, thy beauty is to me / John Fante
Better be an old woman’s darling / Benjamin Franklin
The love kick / William Saroyan
Claustrophobia, or, What every young wife should know / E.B. White
Muzio / Konrad Bercovici
I learn something about sex / Corey Ford
He was so good to her / Frank Sullivan
Fashions in love / Clarence Day, Jr.
Getting on in the world / Morley Callaghan
Bundling, an old Yankee custom / George S. Chappell
A mediaeval romance / Mark Twain
Which is the vainer sex? / Fred C. Kelly
The love letters of Smith / H.C. Bunner
Polly Baker’s lack of virtue is its own reward / Benjamin Franklin
A letter from the Bronx / Arthur Kober
My views on marriage / W.C. Fields
Dusk before fireworks / Dorothy Parker
Leg-pulling / Bernard Sobel
Extracts from Adam’s diary / Mark Twain
Etiquette of courtship / Donald Ogden Stewart
Strip tease / George Weller
The girls of Tongatabu / John Langdon
The triumph of the nut, or, Too many marriages / Christopher Ward

Book Nerd :: New and Used, Eugenics, Paganism, Death, The Devil, etc.

Kevin I. Slaughter — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 20:00:54 +0000

Books acquired over the past week. New on the left, used on the right.

“The Book of Satanic Quotations” edited by Matt G. Paradise (finally got the new edition)
“Jewish Eugenics” by John Glad (still need to read his other book on eugenics)
“Tales for Males” (I’ll have to scan and post the ad for this from the back of old men’s magazines that I’ve seen)
“Male Fantasies, Vol. 2″ Klaus Thewleit (this appears to be feminist/Marxist garbage, but probably funny)
“Hold Back This Day” by Ward Kendall
“Summoning the Gods” by Collin Cleary
“Playboy Book of Humor and Satire”
“The Meaning of Death” edited by Herman Feifel

Book Nerd :: Birthday spoils… (updated)

Kevin I. Slaughter — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 12:40:00 +0000

The first batch of books for my birthday arrived:

I’ve got a few more on the way, but a few of these I’ve been wanting to pic up for a while:

“Real Education” Charles Murray
“Where Dead Voices Gather” Nick Tosches
“You Can’t Say That: The Growing Threat to Civil Liberties from Antidiscrimination Laws” by David E. Bernstein
“Preaching Eugenics:Religious Leaders and the American Eugenics Movement” by Christine Rosen
“The Skeptic: A Life of HL Mencken” by Terry Teachout

Will update when more booty has been seized…
and UPDATED:

Put these in the light box, but I just noticed a goddamn cat hair. I ain’t photoshopping or retaking it at this point.

“Are Cops Racist?” by Heather Mac Donald
“A Century of Eugenics In America: From the Indiana Experiment to the Human Genome Era“, ed. by Paul A. Lombardo

Satanism as Weltanschauung, a lecture in 9 parts (plus Q&A bonus)

Kevin I. Slaughter — Mon, 04 Jul 2011 17:58:37 +0000

I’m pleased to release the video of a lecture given on March 1st of this year when I was invited to speak on the topic of Satanism for a class at the Maryland Institute College of Art. Filmed in HD and edited to include quite a few graphics not presented in the original lecture, I’m pleased with the outcome and hope that for those already familiar with Satanism there is enough to still keep you interested and possibly entertained.

Embedded below is a playlist of all 9 videos, to play without interruption.

Below are two parts of the Q&A session that followed:

If you enjoyed the lecture and would like to make a voluntary monetary donation, please do so below:

Satanism as Weltanschauung

Ch. 1 “Please Allow Me To Introduce Myself…”

Rev. Kevin I. Slaughter introduces himself and gives a short biographical background to establish his long-held interest in Satanism explicitly, but also the occult or hidden aspects of culture.

Ch. 2 “A Brief Overview of Satanism”

Rev. Slaughter gives a very brief overview of Satanism, what a Satanist is, and how it is viewed by society.

Ch. 3 “The Satanic Bible”

Rev. Slaughter discusses the first High Priest of the Church of Satan’s book “The Satanic Bible”. He reads “The Nine Satanic Statements” and other pertinent selections from it.

Ch. 4 “The Satanic Scriptures”

Rev. Slaughter discusses the current High Priest of the Church of Satan’s book “The Satanic Scriptures”. He reads pertinent selections from it.

Ch. 5 “Egalité vs. Hierarchy”

The natural world is stratified, the weak, slow and stupid tend to be worse for wear. The smart, quick and strong tend to have a better time of it. In the animal kingdom, the world that we exist in, it is eat or be eaten.

Rev. Slaughter makes reference to Kurt Vonnegut’s “Harrison Bergeron”, and reads an excerpt from Theodore Dalrymple’s book “Life at the Bottom”.

Ch. 6 “Lex Satanicus”

Satanism takes few overtly political positions, and there is absolutely no affiliation between the Church any political party. The Satanic philosophy positions itself as a third side, rejecting the simplistic dichotomies of good vs. evil, republican vs. democrat, liberal and conservative. The one position most clearly associated with politics is Lex Talionis.

Ch. 7 “Magic”

Magic, in the Satanic sense, is not about shooting fireballs or riding on broomsticks, we do not have “spells” that guarantee sex or death – the two things people always seem to want a spell for. When the Satanist performs greater magic, it is an emotional psychodrama, intended to charge the participant with a specific feeling or to put him in a specific emotional state. It’s made clear in the writings that Greater Magic is an emotional working as opposed to intellectual. Like the power of a masterfully written book or piece of music has, this productive fiction is useful and possibly necessary to the human animal.

Ch. 8 “A Few Unkind Words…”

In this part of the lecture Kevin discusses Christian Child Abuse, a blog that collects stories about pedophile priests. He discusses religiously motivated atrocities committed by Islam and Judaism in the name of their religion and accepted by their communities.

The website is found at http://christianchildabuse.blogspot.com

Ch. 9 “Love”

Satanism isn’t merely a reactionary stance, it is about knowing ones self and building real relationships with worthy people. Rev. Slaughter recites a poem titled “Love” that was written by freethinker Robert Greene Ingersoll, to illustrate this and other points in the Satanic worldview.

Kevin has participated in two oratory contests where contestants read their choice of Ingersoll’s work, and won first place in 2010. The video can be seen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8UPNFcnYIM

Rev. Slaughter is an official representative of the Church of Satan. More information can be found on the website http://www.churchofsatan.com

Filmed and edited by Kevin I. Slaughter for Underworld Amusements: http://www.underworldamusements.com

Music composed and performed by Michaelanthony Mitchell