Humor Bangs, John K.: The Associated Shades: An Omnibus (illus). v1. 06 Feb 2019

[GrannyGrump]

The Associated Shades: An Omnibus
John Kendrick Bangs (1862–1922)
Illustrations by Peter Newell (1862–1924)
(illustrations for Mr. Munchausen in color)

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The contents of this book were first published 1896 through 1903. Text and illustrations are in the public domain in countries where the copyright term is “Life+90” or less, and in the USA.

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The Associated Shades sequence includes Bangs’ possibly best-known works, set in the afterlife in the netherworld of Hades (which is not the same thing as Hell), with important historical, mythological, and fictional personalities humorously portrayed as characters.

### The House-Boat on the Styx (1896)
Notable citizens of Hades, including Socrates, Homer, William Shakespeare, Dr. Samuel Johnson, James Boswell, Charles Darwin, Noah, Hamlet, Baron Munchausen, and many others, establish an exclusive association, with an elaborate house-boat as their clubhouse.

### The Pursuit of the House-Boat (1897)
After the House-Boat is hijacked by Captain Kidd, the members of the Association hire the recently deceased Sherlock Holmes to solve the crime.

### The Enchanted Type-writer (1899)
The late (and invisible) James Boswell, who has become an editor for a newspaper in Hades, communicates with the author by means of an old typewriter.

### Mr. Munchausen (1901)
A series of adventures narrated by the Baron himself, recounting near-impossible exploits around the globe. The fictional German nobleman, conceived by Rudolph Erich Raspe in 1785, is an iconic character who spins the tallest of tall tales.

### Shylock Homes: His Posthumous Memoirs
(newspaper syndication, 1903)
In this Sherlockian parody, Homes, now residing in Hades, transmits his memoirs via steam-powered telegraphy for publication in the mundane world. The mastermind detective has not lost his cunning—a number of puzzling cases reach a solution.

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John Kendrick Bangs (May 27, 1862 – January 21, 1922) was an American author, humorist, satirist, editor and lecturer. Between 1884 and 1906, he worked as editor at a number of magazines, among them Life, Munsey’s, The New Metropolitan, the Harper’s magazines, and the foremost humor magazine of its day, Puck. A highly popular and prolific writer, he had more than sixty books published.

He wrote extensively in the genre of “Bangsian fantasy,” concerning famous literary or historical individuals and their interactions in the afterlife.

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Book texts were obtained from Project Gutenberg; the “Shylock” texts from the Library of Congress newspaper archives; illustrations from the Internet Archive. Transcription, OCR, and printer’s errors were silently corrected; punctuation, diacritics, and italics formatted; some spelling and punctuation normalized. Illustrations manually cleaned and enhanced. Cover adapted from first edition of “A House-Boat on the Styx.” Chapter headings are cross-linked to individual Tables of Contents. Embedded font used for titling.

Versions available WITH and WITHOUT illustrations.

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These are all just loosely-connected short stories, so you needn't feel intimidated by the size. Dip your toes into the Styx, and have a giggle on Mr. Bangs.

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