The Outsider #1: Inscribed by Louise Webb with Custom Box

Published in 1961 LouJon Press, this is a very special copy of The Outsider 1. Publisher “Gypsy Lou Webb” (featured on the cover) has inscribed this copy and in silver ink has covered up the $1 price tag on the cover and painted $3. Although the inscription isn’t dated, she does mention Mardi Gras was happening at the time.

For Elizabeth Hayword

My Love

Gypsy Lou Webb
New Orleans, LA
Mardi Gras

This copy comes with a custom-made box.

This first issue of The Outsider featured “A Charles Bukowski Album” that featured a six-page section with 10 poems:

• Hooray Say The Roses
• Pay Your Rent Or Get Out
• Shoes
• I Am With The Roots Of Flowers
• A Real Thing, A Good Woman
• Go With The Rockets And The Blondes
• Old Man, Dead In A Room
• To A High Class Whore I Refused
• And Then: Age
• Love In A Back Room On The Row
• Nothing Subtle

Interestingly, Go With The Rockets And The Blondes, And Then: Age, and Love In A Back Room On The Row have never been published again.

The other seven poems all appeared in LouJon’s first book, It Catches My Heart In Its Hands, a collection of Bukowski’s poems. That includes Bukowski’s classic, Old Man, Dead In A Room, which would appear in seven magazines, six Bukowski books and one audio recording.

Other contributors include Allen Ginsberg, Henry Miller, Gregory Corso, Diane DiPrima, Gary Snyder, Charles Olson, Edward Dorn, Langston Hughes, Robert Creeley, LeRoi Jones, William S. Burroughs and more.

This copy is in Near Fine condition with a couple of tiny nicks the covers and the usual light yellowing of pages.

John Edgar Webb and Louise “Gypsy Lou” Webb were the founders of LouJon Press.  They published four issues of The Outsider magazine, which became the standard for poetry journals at the time. No other publication attracted nearly the talent that appeared in its pages and the production value of the magazine itself was unrivaled. Bukowski appeared in all four issues, with a large collection of poems in Outsider 1 (1961) and as the named “Outside of the Year” in Outsider 3 (1963), featuring Bukowski on the cover and a large center section.

The Webbs were also responsible for transforming Bukowski into an established writer, even if fame wouldn’t occur until years later. They published Bukowski’s first true books, “It Catches My Heart In Its Hands” (1963) and “Crucifix in a Deathhand” (1965). These books are true works of art in and of themselves. The detail, the printing methods, the craftsmanship, and the pure insanity it took to undertake these endeavors was as unparalleled then and as it is today.

File Box 1