Professor H L Mencken

Miscellaneous Magazine Contributions, 1910-1923 Professor H L Mencken

In this second volume of Mencken's miscellaneous magazine contributions, we find several substantial articles on the drama of Henrik Ibsen, notably A Doll's House. In addition, Mencken wrote a sheaf of reviews for the New York society paper Town Topics, covering such authors as Rabindranath Tagore, George Bernard Shaw, Lord Dunsany, and others. Later reviews or articles for other magazines cover the work of Havelock Ellis, Theodore Dreiser, Frank Harris, and Aldous Huxley. Mencken gave thought to broader literary issues ("The National Literature," "The American Novel"), as well as to the art of literary criticism ("The Motive of the Critic"). Venturing into the political sphere, Mencken wrote several send-ups of the loquacious President Warren G. Harding, including the celebrated satire "A Short View of Gamalielese." He wrote several pungent articles while attending the Washington Disarmament Conference of 1921, as well as several pieces condemning Prohibition. In all, this volume provides a vivid glimpse of the distinctive outlook of America's leading literary and social critic of the time.