Read complete books and articles on: H. L. Mencken

Mencken, H. L. - (Henry Louis Mencken)mĕngˈkən, mĕnˈ–, 1880–1956, American editor, author, and critic, b. Baltimore, studied at the Baltimore Polytechnic. Probably America's most influential journalist, he began his career on the Baltimore Morning Herald at the age of 18, became editor of the Baltimore Evening Herald, and from 1906 until his death was on the staff of the Baltimore Sun or Evening Sun. He also played a key role in the production of two extremely influential national magazines. From 1914 to 1923 he was coeditor of the Smart Set with George Jean Nathan; together they founded the American Mercury in 1924, and Mencken was its sole editor from 1925 to 1933.

Mencken's pungent, iconoclastic criticism and scathing invective, although aimed at all smugly complacent attitudes, was chiefly directed at what he saw as the ignorant, self-righteous, and overly credulous American middle class, members of which he dubbed Boobus americanus. His essays were collected in a series of six volumes, Prejudices (1919–27). In the field of philology he compiled a monumental and lively study, The American Language (1st ed. 1919; 4th ed. 1936; with supplements, 1946, 1948). Among his other works are George Bernard Shaw: His Plays (1905), In Defense of Women (1917), Treatise of the Gods (1930), and the autobiographical trilogy Happy Days, 1880–1892 (1940), Newspaper Days, 1899–1906 (1941), and Heathen Days, 1890–1936 (1943), collected in one volume in 1947. Mencken also fought against the strain of Puritanism in American literature and was an important literary champion of such writers as Theodore Dreiser, Sherwood Anderson, Sinclair Lewis, and Eugene O'Neill. His keen interest in and intelligent appraisal of 20th-century American letters are evident in the posthumously collected essays of H. L. Mencken on American Literature (2002).

Bibliography

See his letters (ed. by G. L. Forgue, 1961) and diary (ed. by C. A. Fecher, 1990); biographies by W. Manchester (1950), C. Angoff (1956), S. Mayfield (1968), C. Bode (1969), F. C. Hobson, Jr. (1994), and T. Teachout (2002); studies by D. C. Stenerson (1971), F. C. Hobson, Jr. (1974), C. Scruggs (1984), and E. A. Martin (1984); A. Bulsterbaum, H. L. Mencken: A Research Guide (1988).

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16 of the Best Books and Articles on: H. L. Mencken

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1.

H. L. Mencken, Critic of American Life » Read Now
by George H. Douglas. 248 pgs.

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2.

H. L. Mencken and the American Mercury Adventure » Read Now
by M. K. Singleton. 272 pgs.

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...H. L. MENCKEN AND THE AMERICAN MERCURY ADVENTURE -i- H. L. MENCKEN AND THE AMERICAN MERCURY ADVENTURE...material for a documented account of H. L. Menckens editorship of...
3.

The Conservative Press in Twentieth-Century America ("American Mercury, 1924-1980" begins on p. 243) » Read Now
by Ronald Lora, William Longton Henry. 729 pgs.

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Including representative journals for the 20th and late 19th centuries, this book profiles the most significant conservative journals of the past century. From the rise of industrial capitalism, when laissez-faire conservatives praised bountiful America, to the end of the Cold War, these journals...
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Including representative journals for the 20th and late 19th centuries, this book profiles the most significant conservative journals of the past century. From the rise of industrial capitalism, when laissez-faire conservatives praised bountiful America, to the end of the Cold War, these journals have covered a variety of topics from differing, sometimes even contradictory, points of view. Yet they speak to the richness and comprehensiveness of the conservative press in America. Together they provide a focused history of conservative thought in 20th Century America.
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4.

Serpent in Eden: H.L. Mencken and the South » Read Now
by Fred C. Hobson, Gerald W. Johnson. 242 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library
5.

Happy Days, 1880-1892 » Read Now
by H. L. Mencken. 322 pgs.

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...DAYS 1880-1892 H. L. MENCKEN Alfred A. Knopf NEW...places. BALTIMORE, 1939. H. L. M. TABLE OF CONTENTS...majestic legend: AUG. MENCKEN BRO. The occasion: the...family, my...
6.

In Defense of Women » Read Now
by H. L. Mencken. 212 pgs.

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...Edited with Introduction By H. L. MENCKEN I YOUTH AND EGOLATRY BY...VI IN DEFENSE OF WOMEN BY H. L. MENCKEN Other volumes in preparation...EDITED WITH INTRODUCTIONS BY H...
7.

Prejudices: Third Series » Read Now
by H. L. Mencken. 328 pgs.

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8.

The American Language: An Inquiry into the Development of English in the United States » Read Now
by H. L. Mencken. 492 pgs.

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9.

Babylonian Frolics: H. L. Mencken and the American Language, in American Literary History » Read Now
by Raymond Nelson. 31 pgs.

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...Babylonian Frolics: H. L. Mencken and The American Language...materials for a fourth edition, H. L. Mencken had made his prolonged study of...crying out in horror and...
10.

The Complex Fate: Hawthorne, Henry James and Some Other American Writers ("Mencken and the American Language" begins on p. 193) » Read Now
by Marius Bewley. 248 pgs.

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11.

Toward a Pluralistic Criticism (Chap. 7 "Mencken and the South") » Read Now
by Oscar Cargill. 212 pgs.

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...Dean Howells to Hart Crane; from the James family to H. L. Mencken. These essays, appearing in periodicals, have across...Robber Baron Revises The Octopus 118 7 Mencken and...
12.

I Hear America ...: Literature in the United States Since 1900 (Chap. IX "Iconoclasm: H. L. Mencken and Sinclair Lewis") » Read Now
by Vernon Loggins. 382 pgs.

Collections: Literature, Entire Library

...221 IX ICONOCLASM 225 H. L. MENCKEN 228 SINCLAIR LEWIS 239...Henry James, Theodore Dreiser and Ezra Pound, and H. L. Mencken and Gertrude Stein. Beneath all his paradoxes...
13.

Structures of the Jazz Age: Mass Culture, Progressive Education, and Racial Discourse in American Modernism ("Intellectuals and the Contemptible Masses: H. L. Mencken and Irving Babbitt" begins on p. 18) » Read Now
by Chip Rhodes. 218 pgs.

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Rhodes grants the truth of appearances to the cliches of the Jazz Age - the lost generation of writers, the era of mass consumption and the silver screen - while revealing their roots in a conservative ideology which sustained Republican rule.
14.

American Literary Criticism, 1900-1950 (Discussion of H. L. Mencken begins on p. 181) » Read Now
by Charles I. Glicksberg. 574 pgs.

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15.

After the Genteel Tradition: American Writers, 1910-1930 (Discussion of H. L. Mencken begins on p. 83) » Read Now
by Malcolm Cowley, Harry T. Moore. 210 pgs.

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16.

Mencken: The American Iconoclast » Read Now
by Marion Elizabeth Rodgers. 662 pgs.

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