'PulpFest' returns to Pittsburgh in August

Ask most people what “pulp fiction” is and the likely reply would be that it’s a movie about two hit men played by Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta.

While that is essentially correct, it’s also true that decades before pop culture content was consumed digitally, it came in the form of fiction periodicals named after the cheap pulp paper they were printed on.

The height of their popularity was between the 1920s and 1950s, when pulp magazines like Amazing Stories, Horror Stories, Love Story Magazine, Western Story Magazine and The Shadow sold up to a million copies per issue. Along with radio dramas and movies, they were an affordable and popular form of entertainment.

The heyday of pulp magazines is being celebrated this August when “PulpFest” returns to the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel in Cranberry as a live event, Aug. 19-21.

PulpFest chairman Jack Cullers said pulp magazines have maintained a cult following because they contain less gratuitous violence and lurid content than that found in contemporary pop culture creations.

“The magazines were written to the standards of the ’30s and ’40s and were a lot less violent and descriptive than things are now,” said Cullers. “I think that’s part of the appeal for people. They can sit down and read something and be a lot less shocked or repulsed.”

“Love in the Shadows” is the theme of PulpFest 2021 as the convention salutes the centennial of Street & Smith’s Love Story Magazine — the best-selling pulp of all time — and the 90^th anniversary of The Shadow, a magazine that gave birth to a popular franchise. At one point, the legendary Orson Welles played the lead role in the radio series and Alec Baldwin starred as “The Shadow” in a 1994 film adaptation.

“I think the appeal of ‘The Shadow’ is that good wins, evil loses, and you can always count on the good guy winning in the end,” said Cullers. “Almost all of the pulp magazines were that way going back to the Westerns and ‘Doc Savage.’ ”

Cullers said PulpFest had traditionally appealed to older men, but is now attracting a younger, more diverse audience.

“A lot of it has to do with the rejuvenation of superheroes,” he said.

One of the highlights of the convention will be a panel discussion of the work of Shadow creator Walter B. Gibson and his creative team. The panel will include writer Will Murray, artist Jim Steranko and publisher Anthony Tollin, each of whom knew Gibson and the other writers who worked for The Shadow magazine.

Also on the agenda is a panel discussion of the work of writer Edgar Rice Burroughs, the creator of “Tarzan.”

There is no charge to attend the panel discussions. However there will be a $20 charge (or $35 for the entire weekend) for access to the dealers room containing pulp magazines, vintage paperbacks, comic books and movies.

For more information, go to pulpfest.com.