"payback"

[Joel S. Berson]

I suspect a problem with Google's
metadata.  Harvard lists "Asia and the Americas"
as published from 1942 to 1946.

Rather, Harvard lists a periodical titled "Asia :
journal of the American Asiatic Association"
whose vol. 17 is 1917; that might make a vol. 23
be 1923.  It holds vol. 23 at Biblioteca
Berenson, Florence, and in the Tozzer Depository,
in some location undisclosed by Harvard.  I don't
propose to go to either location myself.

Joel

At 2/28/2012 09:11 PM, Victor Steinbok wrote:
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
>
>Let's fix this, shall we? Here's the University of Hawaii record for
>something that cannot be found anywhere else, apparently.
>
>>Main Author: Taylor, Merlin Moore.
>>Title: The payback / by Merlin Moore Taylor.
>>Publisher: [New York : C.B. Van Tassel, 1923]
>>Description: p.558-562, 605 : ill. 31cm.
>>Subject(s): Crime -- Papua New Guinea.
>>Papua New Guinea -- Social life and customs.
>>Notes: Caption title.
>>Local Notes: UHM: Detached from Asia, v.23, no.8, August 1923.
>>Location: UH Manoa: Hamilton Pacific-Library Use Only
>>Call Number: GN671.N5 T3  → Text me this call number
>>Copy Number: Copy 1
>>Status: Not Checked Out
>
>The record appears in Amazon.com with no copies available. It also
>appears in GB with no preview. WorldCat lists UH as the only available copy.
>
>Indeed, the title can be confirmed in the Journal Asia and the Americas,
>Volume 23.
>
>http://goo.gl/1twrD
>
>Perhaps someone can track down the original journal in which it
>appeared--note the bibliographic info. I have no access to university
>libraries, at the moment, so I'll take a pass.
>
>In the Heart of Black Papua appears to have been reprinted--at least,
>according to Amazon--last year. There are both hardcover and paperback
>copies available, but they require exorbitant funds--$49 or $34,
>respectively. On the other hand, this book can be tracked down a lot
>easier than The Payback.
>
>Merlin Moore Taylor was W.B. Joyce's secretary on the 1920 expedition to
>Mount Chapman, where a series of photographs were taken and later
>published as Where Cannibals Roam (London, 1924). I'm using passive here
>because it is not clear whether the photographs had been taken by Taylor
>or the expedition's official photographer Harry Downing (whom Taylor
>fails to mention), but all indications are that the pictures were
>Downing's (per Max Quanchi, Photographing Papua, 2007).
>
>There is a war-time source--Osmar White's Green Armor, apparently
>published by Norton (NY) in 1945. The snippet does not contain the word,
>but the preview does. The snippet, however, makes it clear that this is
>war-time context (zeros are mentioned):
>
>http://goo.gl/FcNnY [preview]
>>"Payback" made pacification very difficult. A wrong was done. The
>>wronged family paid back — with a little over for ... It had been far
>>harder to wean the native from his addiction to payback than it had
>>been to cure him of a taste for ...
>
>There is also an earlier mention (1927) in New York Central RR magazine
>Travel.
>
>http://goo.gl/pNme6
>>"The payback, I think, is the strongest native institution. Once
>>started, it can not come to an end until one side to ... That is one
>>reason why punishment for a payback- murder always is as severe as
>>circumstances indicate will make it ...
>
>In this case, the snippet does show the first passage and there is an
>additional page (earlier) where the word appears (likely the same
>article). Given that it talks about a "native institution", I presume it
>is an article on New Guinea.
>
>VS-)
>
>On 2/28/2012 2:28 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>>...
>>
>>   Earliest cite is 1935.
>>
>>1926 Merlin Moore Taylor _In the Heart of Black
>>Papua_  (N.Y.: Robert M. McBride) 67: One
>>"pay-back" inevitably leads to another, with
>>the roles reversed. Ibid.171:  "It will not be
>>over until the handcuffs are on the man who led
>>the pay-back," retorted Humphries grimly.
>
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