Baltimore native Henry Louis Mencken (1880-1956) was an essayist, literary critic, magazine editor, novelist, and journalist. Starting as a reporter for the Baltimore Morning Herald at the turn of the century, Mencken eventually became associated with the Baltimore Sun and his work for the newspaper spanned five decades. In H.L. Mencken: An Annotated Bibliography, S.T. Joshi provides the most exhaustive and comprehensive bibliography of the writings of H. L. Mencken ever assembled. It presents detailed information on his book publications from 1903 to the present, with a full list of editions and reprints. Most significantly, it presents for the first time a comprehensive annotated listing of his magazine and newspaper work (including more than 1,500 anonymous editorials for the Baltimore Sun, Baltimore Evening Sun, and other papers, which have never been listed in any previous bibliographies), a thorough index to his book reviews, and a full list of interviews Mencken gave during his lifetime. Word counts of nearly every item in the bibliography have been supplied, and the book has been thoroughly indexed by name, title, and periodical. Because every item has been annotated, scholars and students can, for the first time, gain an idea of the subject-matter of all Mencken's writings, especially his magazine and newspaper work. The indexes will allow users to locate any given item with ease. The chronological arrangement of each section allows users to understand the growth and development of Mencken's work, making this volume an invaluable resource.

Here is the definitive biography of Mencken, the most illuminating book ever published about this giant of American letters. We see the prominent role he played in the Scopes Monkey Trial, his long crusade against Prohibition, his fierce battles against press censorship, and his constant exposure of pious frauds and empty uplift. The champion of our tongue in The American Language, Mencken also played a pivotal role in defining the shape of American letters through The Smart Set and The American Mercury, magazines that introduced such writers as James Joyce, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Langston Hughes.

Ever in control, H. L. Mencken contrived that future generations would see his life as he desired them to. He even wrote Happy Days, Newspaper Days, and other books to fit the pictures he wanted: first, the carefree Baltimore boy; then, the delighted, exuberant critic of American life. But he only told part of the truth. Over the past twenty-five years, vital collections of the writer's papers have become available, including his literary correspondence, a 2,100-page diary, equally long manuscripts about his literary and journalistic careers, and numerous accumulations of his personal correspondence. The letters and diaries of Mencken's intimates have been uncovered as well. Now Fred Hobson has used this newly accessible material to fashion the first truly comprehensive portrait of this most original of American originals. NOTE: This edition does not include photographs.

Throughout his career as a literary critic, H. L. Mencken was intent on elevating the bold, the daring, and the innovative over the hackneyed, the trite, and the superficial, and his drama criticism exhibits this tendency to the fullest. Though known primarily as a newspaperman and commentator, Mencken also wrote several one-act plays, as well as a full-length work. In The Collected Drama of H. L. Mencken: Plays and Criticism, S. T. Joshi has assembled for the first time Mencken’s dramatic works, comprising six one-act plays and the lengthy three-act play Heliogabalus. These plays, which have never been reprinted since their original appearances in newspapers or in Mencken’s early volume A Book of Burlesques (1916), exhibit Mencken’s penchant for satire and ridicule. Several of the plays, such as In the Vestry Room and The Wedding: A Stage Direction, display Mencken’s oft-expressed cynicism about the institution of marriage. Another related play is Asepsis, a satire on exaggerated concerns about sexual health in young married couples. Other plays take aim at the cultural deficiencies of the common people, such as Death: A Philosophical Discussion, which relays the hackneyed reactions of a group of mourners over the death of a friend. Mencken’s most significant play by far is Heliogabalus, a play he co-wrote with his frequent collaborator, George Jean Nathan, in which Mencken expresses his scorn of the Christian religion. The second half of this book features a selection of Mencken’s early writings (1905–17) on drama, most of which have never been reprinted. Various essays on Shakespeare, Shaw, Synge, Strindberg, Ibsen, and others exhibit Mencken’s keenness as a literary critic and his understanding of the aesthetic possibilities of the drama. With an introduction by the editor who provides an overview of Mencken’s work as a dramatist and drama critic, this collection will be of interest to amateur and even professional drama companies, theatre historians, and of course, anyone interested in the writings of Mencken.

This four-volume reference work surveys American literature from the early 20th century to the present day, featuring a diverse range of American works and authors and an expansive selection of primary source materials. Bringing useful and engaging material into the classroom, this four-volume set covers more than a century of American literary history—from 1900 to the present. Twentieth-Century and Contemporary American Literature in Context profiles authors and their works and provides overviews of literary movements and genres through which readers will understand the historical, cultural, and political contexts that have shaped American writing. Twentieth-Century and Contemporary American Literature in Context provides wide coverage of authors, works, genres, and movements that are emblematic of the diversity of modern America. Not only are major literary movements represented, such as the Beats, but this work also highlights the emergence and development of modern Native American literature, African American literature, and other representative groups that showcase the diversity of American letters. A rich selection of primary documents and background material provides indispensable information for student research.

This latest volume in Roger Geiger's distinguished series on the history of higher education begins with a rare glimpse into the minds of mid-nineteenth century collegians. Timothy J. Williams mines the diaries of students at the University of North Carolina to unearth a not unexpected preoccupation with sex, but also a complex psychological context for those feelings. Marc A. VanOverbeke continues the topic in an essay shedding new light on a fundamental change ushering in the university era: the transition from high schools to college.The secularization of the curriculum is a fundamental feature of the emergence of the modern university. Katherine V. Sedgwick explores a distinctive manifestation by questioning why the curriculum of Bryn Mawr College did not refl ect the religious intentions of its Quaker founder and trustees. Secularization is examined more broadly by W. Bruce Leslie, who shows how denominational faith ceded its ascendancy to "Pan-Protestantism."Where does the record of contemporary events end and the study of history begin? A new collection of documents from World War II to the present invites Roger Geiger's refl ection on this question, as well as consideration of the most signifi cant trends of the postwar era. Educators chafi ng under current attacks on higher education may take solace or dismay from the essay "Shaping a Century of Criticism" in which Katherine Reynolds Chaddock and James M. Wallace explore H. L. Mencken's writings, which address enduring issues and debates on the meaning and means of American higher education.

The New England Watch and Ward Society provides a new window into the history of American Protestantism during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. By suppressing obscene literature, gambling, and prostitution, the moral reform organization embodied Protestant efforts to shape public morality in an increasing intellectually and culturally diverse society.

This groundbreaking new source of international scope defines the essay as nonfictional prose texts of between one and 50 pages in length. The more than 500 entries by 275 contributors include entries on nationalities, various categories of essays such as generic (such as sermons, aphorisms), individual major works, notable writers, and periodicals that created a market for essays, and particularly famous or significant essays. The preface details the historical development of the essay, and the alphabetically arranged entries usually include biographical sketch, nationality, era, selected writings list, additional readings, and anthologies

Originally published in 1950 under title: The letters of Ezra Pound, 1907-1941.

The Freedom of Peaceful Action is the first installment of the trilogy The Nature of Liberty, which makes an ethical philosophic case for individual liberty and the free market against calls for greater government regulation and control. The trilogy makes a purely secular and nonreligious ethical case for the individual’s rights to life, liberty, private property, and the pursuit of happiness as championed by the U.S. Founding Fathers. Inspired by such philosophic defenders of free enterprise as John Locke, Herbert Spencer, and Ayn Rand, The Nature of Liberty shows that such individual rights are not imaginary or simply assertions, but are institutions of great practical value, making prosperity and happiness possible to the degree that society recognizes them. The trilogy demonstrates the beneficence of the individual-rights approach by citing important findings in the emerging science of evolutionary psychology. Although the conclusions of evolutionary psychology have been long considered to be at odds with the philosophies of individual liberty and free markets, The Nature of Liberty presents a reconciliation that reveals their ultimate compatibility, as various important findings of evolutionary psychology, being logically applied, confirm much of what philosophic defenders of liberty have been saying for centuries. Moreover, proceeding from the viewpoint of Rand, this work argues that the structure of society most conducive to practical human well-being is commensurately the most moral and humane approach as well. The trilogy’s first installment, The Freedom of Peaceful Action, focuses on the secular, philosophic foundation for a society based on individual rights. Starting from a defense of the efficacy of observational reason against criticisms from Immanuel Kant and Karl Popper, it demonstrates how a philosophic position of individual liberty and free markets is the logical result of the consistent application of human reason to observing human nature. This installment demonstrates that any political system that wishes for its citizens to thrive must take human nature into account, and that an accounting of human nature reveals that a system of maximum liberty and property protection is the one must conducive to peace and human well-being.