wit's end publishing

Originally published in 1967, this short book of poems is the rarest of Charles Willeford’s works. Used copies of it are available usually in the range of $2,500 to $3,500.

Wit’s End licensed the work from Betsy Willeford, and you can get the book now for $0.99 in the amazon kindle store.

“Willeford’s experience of his life led him to a certain attitude toward the world and his place in it, and this attitude, ironic without meanness, comic but deeply caring, informed every book he ever wrote, from his two volumes of autobiography through all the unnoticed novels.” Donald Westlake

After lighting my cigarette I said, not unkindly, “If you don’t like to fish and you don’t eat fish, why have you been fishing all day? I remember seeing you in this same spot when I crossed the bridge at around nine this morning.” He was silent.

“Because,” he said at last, “I don’t know what else to do. Before I retired I was vice-president of an insurance company in St. Louis. And this is what I always thought I wanted to do someday, retire to Florida and fish. The first day I tried it I discovered I disliked it. I had already bought a house, and my wife wouldn’t let me stay home during the day.

“So I fish. Every day. In the beginning I used to take my catch home. But when I did, my wife felt that it was her duty to cook them. And I hate the taste of fish, the stink of fish and even the smell of other fishermen. That’s why I stand down here by myself. Now when I go home in the evening I tell my wife that I didn’t catch anything. It’s simpler that way. She doesn’t have to prepare the fish, and I don’t have to eat any.”

From Old Man at the Bridge by Charles Willeford

This darkly humorous one act play is a riff on Charles Willeford’s “masterpiece” (as it was called by The Washington Post), THE BLACK MASS OF BROTHER SPRINGER. It re-imagines the ordainment of Sam Springer — a drifter novelist — as a pastor of the Church of God’s Flock in Jacksonville, FL. 

Available for 99 cents at the Kindle Store

“I had a hunch that madness was a predominant theme and normal condition for Americans living in the second half of the century” Charles Willeford

“Willeford’s experience of his life led him to a certain attitude toward the world and his place in it, and this attitude, ironic without meanness, comic but deeply caring, informed every book he ever wrote, from his two volumes of autobiography through all the unnoticed novels.” Donald Westlake