The 1928 Louise Brooks film, Beggars of Life, is based on an earlier bestseller of the same name by Jim Tully, a once-popular “hobo author” and literary celebrity during the Jazz Age.
With the passage of time, however, Tully’s reputation declined and his various books fell out-of print. And for decades, Beggars of Life – an early classic of hobo literature, could only be found in second hand bookshops. Used copies often commanded a premium.
Now, the book is back in print thanks to the efforts of Kent State University Press and two dedicated Tully scholars, Paul Bauer and Mark Dawidziak.
Over the last year and a half, the university press in Kent, Ohio (Tully's one-time home) has begun reissuing the forgotten writer's long-out-of-print books. So far, they've released Circus Parade (with a foreword by the late comix artist Harvey Pekar), Shanty Irish (with a foreword by film director John Sayles), The Bruiser (with a foreword by critic Gerald Early), and Tully's breakthrough work and what's likely his best remembered book, Beggars of Life (with an introduction by series editors Bauer and Dawidziak). Two more titles will follow in 2012.
In the meantime, next year will see the release of Bauer and Dawidziak's long awaited biography, Jim Tully: American Writer, Irish Rover, Hollywood Brawler. The book will include a foreword by the celebrated documentary film maker Ken Burns, who has called it a "wonderful, hugely important biography."
In his heyday, Tully was not only popular but critically acclaimed. His books appeared on bestseller lists, were adapted for the stage, made into movies, and were reviewed in major publications across the country. The famous critic H.L. Mencken was a longtime champion of the hobo writer.
Some consider Tully a precursor to the "hard-boiled" school. In the Twenties, Tully wasn't writing about the glitz and glamour of the Jazz Age. Rather, his singular brand of rough and tumble realism concerned petty criminals, addicts, the down-and-out and other misfits of society. Charles Willeford, one of the leading post WWII hard-boiled crime fiction writers, has praised Tully and written of his influence.
Published in 1924, Beggars of Life was the first of five autobiographical books Tully regarded as part of a larger single work – an "Underworld Edition" – which told his life story in novelistic terms.
Born near St. Marys, Ohio in 1886, Tully experienced an impoverished childhood. After the death of his mother in 1892, Tully's Irish immigrant ditch-digger father sent the boy to an orphanage in Cincinnati. He remained there for six years until the misery became more than he could bear. Tully ran away – though he was only a teenager.
Thereafter, what education this wild boy of the road received largely came in hobo camps, railroad yards, and small towns scattered across the country. Tully is known to have stolen books by favorite writers (such as Dostoyevsky) from the local libraries in which he often found shelter.
Tully scholars Bauer and Dawidziak have described Tully as "the greatest long shot in American literature." Considering his ramshackle life and lack of formal schooling, it’s a miracle he wrote as much and as well as he did. Now, fans of Louise Brooks eager to read the book behind what is fast becoming the actress’ best regarded American silent film have the chance. Jump.
More info: Jim Tully’s Beggars of Life is available from online retailers and Indiebound.
Thomas Gladysz is an arts journalist and author. Recently, he wrote the introduction to a new “Louise Brooks edition” of Margarete Böhme's classic book, The Diary of a Lost Girl (PandorasBox Press). Gladysz will speak about his new book at the Village Voice Bookshop in Paris on January 13, followed by a screening of the film at the nearby Action Cinema.
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