A Book of Prefaces — Context and Discussion

Mencken's Critical Method

The excerpts reveal Mencken's characteristic blend of erudition and invective. In the chapter on Huneker, he contrasts the critic's genuine gusto with the sterile learning of academic critics such as Paul Elmer More, William Lyon Phelps, and W. C. Brownell. He dismisses More's Sanskrit teaching at Bryn Mawr as 'an enterprise as stimulating (and as intelligible) as that of setting off fire-works in a blind asylum.' Mencken's own prose is deliberately provocative, employing vivid metaphors and a conversational tone that shifts between praise and scorn. He praises Huneker as 'the solitary Iokanaan in this tragic aesthetic wilderness,' the only critic whose vision 'sweeps the whole field of beauty.' This hyperbolic style is typical of Mencken's approach: he constructs a pantheon of admired figures—Conrad, Dreiser, Huneker—while attacking the prevailing critical establishment.

The Dreiser and Conrad Portraits

Mencken's treatment of Dreiser emphasizes the author's 'curious unevenness' and his 'solid dignity as an artist' that becomes more evident over time. He notes that Dreiser's place in American literature is 'frequently challenged, and often violently, but never successfully.' The Conrad chapter, though not excerpted in full, is referenced in the preface where Mencken discusses the prices of Conrad first editions. The catalog subjects list Conrad and Dreiser as subjects of criticism, and the excerpts confirm that Mencken engages with their works as a defender against contemporary detractors. He positions himself as a champion of literary merit against moralistic or superficial criticism.

Attacks on Academic Criticism

A substantial portion of the Huneker chapter is devoted to excoriating academic critics. Mencken derides Paul Elmer More's learning as 'sterile, foppish' and William Lyon Phelps for treating 'a fine art as a moral matter.' He cites John Macy's The Spirit of American Literature as 'the soundest, wisest book on its subject,' yet notes it sells for fifty cents on a remainder counter. Mencken lists a handful of competent critics—Macy, Ludwig Lewisohn, Van Wyck Brooks, Burton Rascoe—but laments that none has 'any appreciable influence upon the main stream of American criticism.' The tone is combative, and Mencken's own authority is asserted through his command of European literature and his willingness to name names.

Readers should note that A Book of Prefaces is not a neutral survey but a polemical intervention in early twentieth-century American literary criticism. Mencken's judgments are delivered with characteristic force, and his targets are as important as his heroes. The book's structure—four discrete essays—allows for focused engagement with each subject, but the unifying thread is Mencken's campaign against what he sees as provincialism and moralism in American letters.

Reading Mencken’s prefaces, I kept thinking of his irritation with polite restraint in Dreiser’s critics. It felt familiar, that impatience, then softened. Later I remembered how Sydney Smith — A Reader’s Guide set criticism as wit with a pulse, not a hammer. Both remind me that taste is a quiet argument, never quite finished.