Here at Bowker, we’re mad about Mad Men. For those of you not in the know, Mad Men is the AMC drama that has won two Golden Globes and an Emmy for  best drama on television. The story revolves around the fictional Stirling Cooper Ad Agency and its employees in the golden era of American advertising - the early 1960’s. Brilliantly written, with complex storylines, and even more complex characters, this show is absorbing - it’ll keep you thinking, and talking for days.

In addition to its writing, one of the great strengths of this show is the attention to period detail; from the clothes, to the decorating, to the extracurricular activities the characters engage in, every detail is painstakingly researched. They go to the hot Broadway shows of the day, dine in the most posh restaurants of the time, and, yes, read the most talked-about books of the era. Leon Uris’s Exodus played a role in a significant season one plot point; Katherine Anne Porter’s Ship of Fools has been used to underscore the situation of one of the character’s wives; Bert Cooper, one of the agency’s owners, makes frequent mention of Ayn Rand; Frank O’Hara’s Meditations in an Emergency opens and closes the second season.

It can be hard to be a book lover and watch this show without interest being cultivated in the works of this era; I myself have gone out and read Fitzgerald’s The Diamond as Big as the Ritz thanks to a mention on the show, and went ahead and re-read Jacqueline Susann’s classic Valley of the Dolls, just to stay immersed in the flavor of the era after the second season ended.

While it can be relatively easy to find a list of books that have been featured on the show (various publications in print and on the web have covered the topic), I thought I’d delve a little further and find some other books from the decade. After all, I’m sure I’m not the only one wanting to discover a great book that is new to me, and it can be fun sometimes to see what was popular once upon a time in America.

With a little research, I was able to find lists of 1960’s fiction bestsellers from both Publisher’s Weekly and The New York Times.  The number ones from each publication were as follows:

1960

• PW - Advise and Consent by Allen Drury
• NYT - Hawaii by James Michener

1961

• PW - The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone
• NYT - The Last of the Just by Andre Schwartz-Bart
• NYT - The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone
• NYT - Franny and Zooey - J.D. Salinger

1962

• PW - Ship of Fools by Katherine Anne Porter
• NYT - Ship of Fools by Katherine Anne Porter
• NYT - A Shade of Difference by Allen Drury
• NYT - Seven Days in May by Fletcher Knebel

1963

• PW - The Shoes of the Fisherman by Morris L. West
• NYT - Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters by J.D. Salinger
• NYT - The Glass Blowers by Daphne Du Maurier
• NYT - The Shoes of the Fisherman by Morris L. West
• NYT - The Group by Mary McCarthy

1964

• PW - The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John LeCarre
• NYT - The Spy Who Came in from the Cold by John LeCarre
• NYT - The Rector of Justin by Louis Auchincloss
• NYT - Herzog by Saul Bellow

1965

• PW - The Source by James Michener
• NYT - Up the Down Staircase by Bel Kaufman
• NYT - The Source by James Michener

1966

• PW - Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann
• NYT - Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann
• NYT - The Secret of Santa Vittoria by Robert Crichton

1967

• PW - The Arrangement by Elia Kazan
• NYT - The Arrangement by Elia Kazan
• NYT - The Eighth Day by Thornton Wilder
• NYT - The Chosen by Chiam Potok
• NYT - The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron

1968

• PW - Airport by Arthur Hailey
• NYT - Airport by Arthur Hailey
• NYT - Couples by John Updike
• NYT - The Salzburg Connection by Helen MacInnes

1969

• PW - Portnoy’s Complaint by Philip Roth
• NYT - Portnoy’s Complaint by Philip Roth
• NYT - The Love Machine by Jacqueline Susann
• NYT - The Godfather by Mario Puzo

This list is by no means exhaustive; it is, after all, only the number ones. Among the other bestselling authors of the decade are Harper Lee, John Steinbeck, William Faulkner, Ian Fleming, Mary Stewart, Bernard Malamud, Ira Levin, Gore Vidal, and Harold Robbins. And if you want to go back a little into the late 50’s, you can check out Grace Metalious, Boris Pasternak, Edwin O’Connor, and Vladimir Nabokov.

For more information on historical bestsellers, the Publisher’s Weekly lists that I checked can be accessed here.

The Mad Men season three premiere is this Sunday, August 16th, at 10 pm. Enjoy, and happy reading!