"Sifriyat HaBalash" and "Sifriya Balashit" – Bound Volume of Booklets – 1931-1932

21 booklets from the series "Sifriyat HaBalash" and "Sifriya Balashit" bound together. Booklets 1-12 from the series "Sifriyat HaBalash" / booklet 11-20 from the series "Sifriya Balashit". Tel Aviv, [1931-1932].
The journalist Shlomo Ben-Israel (1908-1989), who published the booklets and wrote most of them under different pen names, used the private detective David Tidhar as the hero of "Sifriyat HaBalash". On the title page of booklets from this series appears a photograph of Tidhar. Late in 1931, Tidhar grew weary of fame and asked Ben-Israel to stop using him as a character, and his name appears no longer in booklets from "Sifryia Balashit" series.
The first booklet from "Sifriyat HaBalash" opens with a "letter from Avigdor Hameiri (instead of an introduction)" in which Hameiri (who employed Ben Israel as a secretary) emphasizes the need for popular Hebrew literature written in the "language of the ear" and not the "Language of the eye", and the importance of detective stories in educating the public during a period when the Mandate police did nothing to protect the Jewish population in Palestine.
21 booklets, 16.5 cm. Good overall condition. Lacking cover and title page of booklet 11 from "Sifriya Balashit" series. Lacking cover of booklet 16 from "Sifryia Balashit" series. Stains. Creases. Damage to binding. Ownership inscription on front endpaper.