The Bedside Mad

I first purchased "The Bedside Mad" at a garage sale as an 11-year-old kid in the 1970s. I read it, re-read it, and then read it some more. As a fan of Mad magazine way back when, "The Bedside Mad" was very different from what I was used to. It didn't take me long, however, to start rolling on the floor laughing. I'd seen some of the artists' work before, notably that of Jack Davis, in the magazine; however, I'd never seen anything by Wally Wood or Bill Elder. Elder, in particular, captured my imagination: "Outer Sanctum" and "Restaurant" have *so many* puns, jokes, and funny details in the background of the drawings that it makes me chuckle now just thinking about it. Over the years I purchased more of the old Mad paperbacks, and Elder's work was always "it" for me. Many years later, I still have my old copy of "The Bedside Mad", and have now corrupted my own two kids' minds with it! They love it as much as I did.

In addition to what's been said, this book seems to illustrate well the transition of Mad Magazine from the "Tales Calculated To Drive You Mad" mock-horror genre to the general satire that would come later. The Scenes We'd Like To See segment, the Cane Mutiny send-up, and others are typical of the Mad of the 1960s, but the "Outer Sanctum" segment seems to hark back to the earlier era.

The original edition of "The Bedside MAD" was published in April 1959 by Signet Books. Originally Ballantine Books had started printing "MAD" paperbacks and published the first five, but Signet offered a better deal and Bill Gaines changed publishers. So this is the sixth book in the series of anniversary reprints of the early "MAD" paperbacks and explains the giant "ANNIVERSARY EDITION" banner running along the right border of the cover.The title "The Bedside MAD" was a take off on the various "bedside readers" that were in vogue at the time and offers the first original cover art for a "MAD" paperback, done by illustrator Kelly Freas (compare with the Norman Mingo cover for the 1973 reissue on page xii). "MAD" has switched to being a magazine in 1959, but with two exceptions the material contained here is from the comic book period when it was created, written, and edited by Harvey Kurtzman. "Outer Sanctum!" is a Kurtzman classic from "MAD" #5 that manages to do a parody of both the radio thriller "Inner Sanctum" and all of the E.C. horror comics like "Tales from the Crypt." "The Lone Stranger Rides Again!" is, as the title indicates, a second look at "The Lone Ranger" from "MAD" #8 (cf. "MAD" #3). There are some choice examples from some of the best artists in the "MAD" gang of usual idiots. Jack Davis does "Scenes We'd....Like to See!" and "Slow Motion," as well as the classic parody of "Hah! Noon!" from "MAD" #9, and a new take on Ernest Lawrence Thayer's poem "Casey at the Bat!" ("MAD" #6). Wallace Wood does "The Cane Mutiny" from "MAD" #19 (with "Captain Kweeg"). Bill Elder chips in with art on "Medical" ("MAD" #28), "Restaurant" ("MAD" #16), and the Kurtzman written "Robinson Crusoe!" ("MAD" #13).All of these bits predate the point in my life when I started reading and enjoying the sick humor offered by "MAD," but if your choice is going back and looking at the old stuff or trying to make your way through the new stuff, then I say turn your back on the present and look backwards, boys and girls, to when "MAD" was a comic book and not a magazine. There are so many classic bits here that when I picked up the collected E.C. library I went with the option for getting the "MAD" volumes in color. That was not a mistake.