Описание: H. L. Mencken was the most provocative and influential journalist and cultural critic in twentieth-century America. In this volume and a companion, The Library of America presents all six series of Prejudices (1919-1927), the iconoclastic collections that helped blast American literature out of its complacency and into a new age of frankness and maturity. The fantastic linguistic inventiveness, full-bodied humor, and unwaveringly fierce courage of his journalism made him a liberating force for his contemporaries. The final three series show Mencken at his lacerating best, taking on targets from religious fundamentalism to the dismal state of higher education. Included are such famous essays as "The Hills of Zion," his report on the local atmosphere surrounding the Scopes trial in 1925; "In Memoriam: W.J.B.," his relentless postmortem on William Jennings Bryan; "The Fringes of Lovely Letters," a hilarious delineation of the lower and outer reaches of the literary world; "Comstockery," a devastating account of the anti-obscenity crusader Anthony Comstock ("A good woman, to him, was simply one who was efficiently policed"); and "On Living in Baltimore," a celebration of his beloved native city. Mencken was a man of strong enthusiasms and even stronger antipathies, expressed in a prose style that marshaled all the resources of the American language in a rich blend of comic invention and sarcastic fury. To read Prejudices is to embark on an exploration of many curious byways of American culture in a moment of tumultuous and often combative transition. Mencken never shied from combat, and the courage with which he confronted the entrenched truisms and hypocrisies of his time made him a uniquely liberating force in American letter
"Mencken weighs 172 pounds, is 5 feet 10 inches in height and not beautiful. His chief amusement, after reading, is piano-playing, this he does very crudely. He takes no exercise except walking and is a moderate eater and drinker. He sometimes drinks as little as one bottle of beer a week, though this doesn't happen very often." So wrote H. L. Mencken about himself, in a brief sketch of his life penned in 1905. Perhaps America's foremost literary stylist and most mordant wit, Mencken's most engaging writing told about his own life and experiences. In Mencken on Mencken, veteran Mencken editor and scholar S. T. Joshi has assembled a hefty collection of the best of Mencken's autobiographical pieces that have not appeared previously in book form. These forty-four selections cover a wide variety of topics ranging from incidents from Mencken's everyday life to reflections on friends and colleagues to his careers as author, journalist, and editor, to his travels abroad. As a journalist in Baltimore, Mencken encountered many unusual characters: a professional mourner hired by a beer distiller, a wagon driver who slept through the great Baltimore fire of 1904, a confirmed bachelor who left town to avoid the clutches of a predatory widow. He provides accounts of literary figures he knew, such as Theodore Dreiser, and ruminations on his work at the Baltimore Sun and as editor for the magazines Smart Set and the American Mercury. In an essay titled "What I Believe," he eschews humor and writes straightforwardly of his longtime scorn for the idea of religion, and in his journalist mode he reflects on a half-century of attending political conventions, drawing on his vast inside knowledge to savage the corruption and incompetence of the political class. A superb travel writer, Mencken gives us a rollicking account of beer-drinking in Munich, astute observations of political unrest in Cuba, and carefully drawn scenes from a long tour he and his wife made of the Mediterranean in 1934. Joshi has thoroughly annotated the pieces and also compiled an extensive glossary of names and terms that Mencken mentions. Mencken on Mencken offers a fully rounded self-portrait of one of America's most colorful personalities and most extraordinary men of letters.
Автор: Swaim Don Название: The H. L. Mencken Murder: A Literary Thriller ISBN: 1504011171 ISBN-13(EAN): 9781504011174 Издательство: Неизвестно Цена: 2501.00 р. Наличие на складе: Есть у поставщика Поставка под заказ.
Описание: 1948 is a leap year and a good one for Harry S. Truman. The second-hand book dealers on Manhattan's Fourth Avenue are in full swing. Howard inherits his father's shabby bookshop, but Howard isn't a true bookman, and he knows how little money there is in the business-until a seemingly priceless manuscript falls into his lap. But there's something odd about it. Howard decides to check out his treasure with an acerbic fellow in Baltimore, a man Howard's late father believed could solve all literary problems: H. L. Mencken. The results are deadly.
Автор: Mencken H. L. Название: The American Language, Second Edition ISBN: 0982129882 ISBN-13(EAN): 9780982129883 Издательство: Неизвестно Цена: 3702.00 р. Наличие на складе: Есть у поставщика Поставка под заказ.
Описание: A major literary event: Mencken's dazzling autobiography, with 200 pages of his own never-before-published commentary and photos. In 1936, at the age of fifty-five, H. L. Mencken published a reminiscence about his boyhood in The New Yorker, beginning a long and magnificent adventure in autobiography by America's greatest journalist. Mencken went on to gather his childhood recollections in Happy Days (1940), a richly detailed, poignant account of growing up in Baltimore. A critical and popular success, the book surprised many with its glimpses of a less curmudgeonly Mencken, and there soon followed the absorbing sequels Newspaper Days (1941), charting his rise at the Baltimore Herald from cub reporter to editor, and Heathen Days (1943), recounting his varied excursions as journalist and public figure, including his coverage of the Scopes trial in 1925. But unknown to the legions of Days books' admirers, Mencken continued to add to them after publication, annotating and expanding each volume in typescripts sealed to the public for twenty-five years after his death. Until now, most of this material--often more frank and unvarnished than the original Days books--has never been published. Containing nearly 200 pages of previously unseen writing, and illustrated with photographs from Mencken's archives, many taken by Mencken himself, this expanded and definitive edition of the Days trilogy is a cause for celebration. LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation's literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America's best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.
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