Photographed with an iPhone, vintage pulp magazine spines compress into a single visual stratum, examining popular fiction as both cultural sediment and material archive. The title merges “stratification” and “fiction,” framing these layered spines as archaeological markers revealing what was read, categorized, and consumed across decades.

Science fiction, fantasy, westerns, and writing guides collapse into proximity, suggesting genre divisions are ultimately porous and artificial. Aged palettes—deep blues, dusky oranges, worn yellows—and visible wear (creases, tears, rubbed ink) emphasize literature as physical object and relic. These cheap magazines were meant as disposable entertainment yet shaped generations of storytelling. The photograph reanimates cultural materials on the brink of oblivion, revealing how fiction’s physical debris often outlasts the myths it perpetuated.

Essay written: November 2025