Leonard Lyons's Copy of Monster Rally by Charles Addams

They say that two heads are better than one. But nobody says it better than Charles Addams (1912-1988).

The matte cuts off the writing right where the dedicatee's name should be.

The souvenir drawing shows Pugsley more than a decade before he received his Addams Family name chasing a cat with more than the usual feline attributes.

A letter of authenticity from late 2023 is interesting because it predates the drawing's removal from a book, Monster Rally (1950), and its subsequent framing and possibly cropping. Thus we learn that this drawing was originally dedicated to theater columnist Leonard Lyons (1906-1976) who wrote "The Lyons Den" in the New York Post. In the year 1950 both Addams and Lyons had hit their mid-career strides and the artist's inscription "with affection" seems heartfelt.

The framed drawing was listed by Meier and Sons Rare Books of New Canaan for $4495 and archived by me in April. It has subsequently been sold.

Charles Addams
AbeBooks listing accessed April 20, 2024

https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=31807373893&searchurl=sortby%3D0%26kn%3DNew%2BYorker%26sgnd%3Don&cm_sp=snippet-_-srp2-_-title21

Charles Addams
AbeBooks item description

Note:  Personalized Charles Addams books can be quite wonderful, but one wonders how many of the ones bearing original drawings will eventually be sacrificed so the images can appear framed on someone's wall. If you've got original Addams art in books or removed from them, framed or unframed, I'd like to post your images right here. Send a scan or two and tell me what you know about them please.

Film critic Jeffrey Lyons is one of four sons of Broadway writer Leonard Lyons.

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