Armed Services Editions

Armed Services Editions (ASEs) were small, compact, paperback books printed by the Council on Books in Wartime for distribution within the American military during World War II. This program was in effect from 1943 to 1946. The ASEs were designed to provide entertainment to soldiers serving overseas, while also educating them about political, historical, and military issues. The slogan of the Council on Books in Wartime was, "Books are weapons in the war of ideas."

ASE Titles

The ASE program featured an array of fiction and non-fiction titles, including classics, contemporary bestsellers, biographies, drama, poetry, and genre fiction (mysteries, sports, fantasy, action/adventure, westerns). Non-fiction books included biographies, religious/self-help titles, and science titles. Most of these books were printed in unabridged versions. The distinctive covers bore the description, "Armed Services Edition: This is the Complete Book-- Not a Digest." 91 of the titles printed were abridged, usually for length rather than content. These bore the slogan, "Condensed for wartime reading." Over the life of the program, 123 million copies of 1,322 titles were printed. This makes the ASE program one of the largest wide-scale distributions of free books in history.

For a list of titles in the series, and to see how the books were numbered, see [http://www.armedserviceseditions.com/ASE%20Listing%20by%20Title.htm]

Publishing

The small books were convenient for soldiers because they fit easily into a cargo pocket. Finished size varied slightly, from 5 1/2" to 6 1/2" in length and from 3 7/8" to 4 1/2" in height. (Unlike traditional paperbacks, ASEs were bound on the short side of the text block rather than the long side, due to the printing presses used.) They were printed on digest and pulp magazine presses, usually in two columns per page for easier reading. The cost for printing was around 6 cents per copy, and royalties of one cent per copy were split between authors and publishers. This early experiment with mass paperback printing helped to prove the viability of paperback publishing in the United States.

Popularity

ASEs were apparently very popular among the armed forces. Copies were shared, re-read, and ripped in half so they could accommodate two readers at once. A contemporary newspaper article recounted, "The hunger for these books, evidenced by the way they are read to tatters, is astounding even to the Army and Navy officers and the book-trade officials who conceived Editions for the Armed Services" (Wittels, 11). For some readers, the ASEs were the first books they had picked up since high school.

Armed Services Editions Today

Today, many Armed Services Editions are still readily available from used booksellers. However, the rarer titles from the series are difficult to find and very valuable. The scarcest tend to be the titles produced at the beginning and the ending of the series. Other titles are more common but valuable because they appeal to a wider array of collectors. "Superman" and "A Rose for Emily" consistently bring the highest prices.

The only complete set of ASEs is owned by the Library of Congress. Near-complete sets are in the libraries of the University of Alabama, the University of South Carolina and the University of Virginia. University of Notre Dame boasts 1064 titles, and the University of Texas, the University of Rochester, Princeton University, Dartmouth College and the University of Wisconsin-Madison have special Armed Services Edition collections.

In addition to the sets belonging to institutions, as listed above, there is one known complete set and another near-complete set (missing 2 books) which are held by private collectors.

Further reading

* Cole, John Young [Editor] . Books In Action: The Armed Services Editions. Available online through Library of Congress Center for the Book [http://www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/becites/cfb/84600198.html]
*Jamieson, John. "Books for the Army". New York: Columbia University Press, 1950.
*Miller, Daniel [Curator] . Books Go To War. Online exhibition at the University of Virginia Library. [http://www.lib.virginia.edu/small/exhibits/ase/]
*Wittels, David. "What the G. I. Reads." "Saturday Evening Post", June 23, 1945. P. 11, 91-92.

External links

* [http://www.lib.virginia.edu/small/exhibits/ase/ "Books Go To War: The Armed Services Editions of World War Two," virtual exhibit at the University of Virginia]