[$20, postpaid] SCREED is Jack's first major published work. It was never officially reviewed or stocked in stores. Here's what Ed Abbey had to say about it: "I liked it very much. In fact, I've been reading it aloud to my wife in bed at night. ...In a natural, organic, free-flowing and perfectly lucid style that I much admire."

These are rare. I'm selling collector copies when I can find them. Published by John Bennett's Vagabond Press, 1981. (They fetch as much as $75 elsewhere.)

Note: I also sell 7 other Jack Saunders titles ($10-$30)---email for more info.

Here's a photo from the time of publication...

General Description of Screed

SCREED is lean and punchy as can be but I'm not sure that a specific plot description is needed, plot being passe' as it is. This should do...

In no-holds-barred "Florida writer" tradition, Jack Saunders writes about everyday life, publishing and academia. About what it's like to work while being true to oneself, one's family and culture. It's about someone trying to do their best in the modern world. (Give it a try and see where it gets you, is one of his motifs.) He writes candidly and creatively, and that's the understatement of the year, yet it's accessible, it fits like an old shoe. It's writing you've been waiting for. It's strong, painful and hopeful. It'll shock you, warm you. It's like coffee, an acquired taste---the sign of a step up. He writes with encyclopedic insight about how his efforts relate to the world around him. In folk vernacular with local color that won't quit, yet it's also a linguistic eye-opener. It's that big. Jack uses cultural details so superbly you'll be spurred to rent movies, read books, listen to music that you never would've otherwise. Each book is a slice of a larger ouevre--with stories, letters, memoir, poetry and essays all playing off each other. He plays jazz and blues in his work. He's developed several major literary innovations, including a new genre: enema verite'. He's in the mainstream of American outsiders: Whitman, Melville, Faulkner, Kerouac, Miller, Algren, Thompson, Bukowski, Willeford and Finster. Except for insiders and undergrounders, he is unknown. But he's been prolific, giving it his all for 30+ years now. Why haven't you heard of him? Find out...

Reviews
"It's good diatribe. The reason I know is that diatribe makes me feel better. And I felt better reading it." --Walker Percy

"Nicely done. He rolls on." --Charles Bukowski

"In Jack Saunders our generation is extremely lucky to have a powerful and determined writer, an honest writer. A Diogenes not merely of words, but of provocative thoughts. From his hideaway in Florida, like a super-energized lobster, Saunders lashes out at the sickening hypocrisy which is deadening our senses and rotting our souls. It is Saunders' adamant, boneheaded, determined persistence that is his great strength, his great gift to a society staggering in its own materialistic greed. Saunders is America at its best. He spells out what spirit is all about. And humanity. How do we live? When do we really come ALIVE? As we should? And deserve? America needs writers with such strength and ferocity and independence and integrity, not all those greedy little wordmongers contemplating their private parts on every supermarket shelf. Saunders is more than a literary volcano. He is a live, writhing, crackling wire. Spewing sparks in all directions. Creating and developing a brighter, newer world." --Raymond Barrio

Excerpt

First you must realize that you only have yourself to work on. You must accept that way things are, quit hurting yourself.

If you can do this it's not only very liberating, it throws a monkey wrench into their plans, because you no longer play the game by their rules. You're a loose can on the deck.

It tricks them into thinking about the matter, and looking at it from a novel perspective. Now you've got them on the run. They're not used to thinking, putting themselves in somebody else's shoes, they are dismayed, angry without knowing why, vaguely anxious, no B vitamins, instinctively they reach for MORE SUGAR. They get a little lift and then down, down, MORE TEEVEE. They reach for a newspaper, it's all ads for sugar and teevee. Anger becomes rage, apprehension fright. They panic. A sane man, a healthy man, a man at peace with himself has a tremendous advantage over a panicked person, a herd, a stampede.

Big Daddy Lipscomb said, "Once you get them spooked, the rest is easy."

If I'm not cured I'm getting better.