The Malevolent Jobholder

Published by Editor on April 26, 2013

by H.L. Mencken (pictured) IN THE IMMORAL monarchies of the continent of Europe, now happily abolished by God’s will, there was, in the old days of sin, an intelligent and effective way of dealing with delinquent officials. Not only were they subject, when taken in downright corruption, to the ordinary processes of the criminal laws; in [...]

The Collected Drama of H.L. Mencken

Published by Editor on October 1, 2012

a review by George Hunka H.L. MENCKEN cut his satirical teeth on drama and theatre, as the excellent new anthology, The Collected Drama of H.L. Mencken: Plays and Criticism, edited by S.T. Joshi and published by Scarecrow Press, attests. Joshi has collected all of Mencken’s plays (many of which first appeared in the 1916 A [...]

Gore Vidal on H.L. Mencken

Published by Editor on September 17, 2012

by Gore Vidal AFTER POLITICS, JOURNALISM has always been the preferred career of the ambitious but lazy second-rater. American exceptions to mediocrity’s leaden mean: From column A, there was Franklin D. Roosevelt. From column B, H.L. Mencken. Although Henry Louis Mencken was a magazine editor (The Smart Set, The American Mercury), a literary critic, an expositor [...]

The Zoo

Published by Editor on January 25, 2011

by H.L. Mencken (pictured) I OFTEN WONDER how much sound and nourishing food is fed to the animals in the zoological gardens of America every week, and try to figure out what the public gets in return for the cost thereof. The annual bill must surely run into millions; one is constantly hearing how much [...]

America Needs a New Ingersoll

Published by Editor on January 3, 2011

Robert Ingersoll (pictured) was a lantern of reason in a nation of fools by H.L. Mencken WHAT the country lacks is obviously an Ingersoll. It is, indeed, a wonder that the chautauquas have never spewed one forth. Certainly there must be many a jitney Demosthenes on those lonely circuits who tires mightily of the standard [...]

Daytonians Full of Sickening Doubts About Publicity

Published by Editor on July 22, 2010

A Report on the Scopes Trial by H.L. Mencken Illustration: Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan (The Baltimore Evening Sun, July 9, 1925) ON THE EVE of the great contest Dayton is full of sickening surges and tremors of doubt. Five or six weeks ago, when the infidel Scopes was first laid by the heels, [...]

Homo Neanderthalensis

Published by Editor on July 21, 2010

A Report on the Scopes Trial by H.L. Mencken (pictured) (The Baltimore Evening Sun, June 29, 1925) I SUCH OBSCENITIES as the forthcoming trial of the Tennessee evolutionist, if they serve no other purpose, at least call attention dramatically to the fact that enlightenment, among mankind, is very narrowly dispersed. It is common to assume [...]

Franklin Delano Roosevelt: An Obituary

Published by Editor on May 17, 2010

by H.L. Mencken April 13, 1945 THE BALTIMORE Sun editorial on Roosevelt this morning begins: “Franklin D. Roosevelt was a great man.” There are heavy black dashes above and below it. The argument, in brief, is that all his skullduggeries and imbecilities were wiped out when “he took an inert and profoundly isolationist people and [...]

Meet General Grant

Published by Editor on April 30, 2010

by H.L. Mencken A review of Meet General Grant by W. E. Woodward (Horace Liverwright, publishers); The American Mercury, 1928 THE DREADFUL title of this book is not the least of its felicities. If they had been saying such things in his day it seems unquestionable that Grant would have said, “Meet the wife.” He [...]

The Calamity of Appomattox

Published by Editor on April 29, 2010

by H.L. Mencken The American Mercury, September 1930 NO AMERICAN historian, so far as I know, has ever tried to work out the probable consequences if Grant instead of Lee had been on the hot spot at Appomattox. How long would the victorious Confederacy have endured? Could it have surmounted the difficulties inherent in the [...]

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