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Huan Yi Member Ascendant
since 2004-10-12
Posts 6688Waukegan |
. I’m finishing a biography of H. L. Mencken and it leads me to reflect and ask: has there ever been a successful man of letters, poet, journalist, etc. who, in hindsight at the facts of his life, did not, in large part, turn out to be an ass? Fortunately for me perhaps, Mark Strand is still too much alive for anyone to touch him. . |
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Balladeer
Administrator
Member Empyrean
since 1999-06-05
Posts 25505Ft. Lauderdale, Fl USA |
It would depend on how you define ass, I would think. |
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serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
and even my ass keeps redefining herself... But does it really matter? I believe it takes a certain amount of arrogance to put the pen to page to begin with--so to hell with the opinions regarding the personality--it takes a certain amount of arrogance to make a judgement for even the kindest of eulogies, anyhow. Don't let it get you down, John. The appendage of post-mortem critics doesn't change what was writ, nor what moves you still. It is part of the human condition, sadly, to attack--and if they can't attack the most pristine works of art, they will go for the human jugular of social conscience. Sorry, for the bitters, too. *shrug* That's another part of the human condition. |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
"14 If a man craves attention because of his poems, he shall be like a jackass in moonlight." --Mark Strand If a man doesn't... |
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Huan Yi Member Ascendant
since 2004-10-12
Posts 6688Waukegan |
. Mike, By his own diaries the man was a racist and a bigot, and the only defense offered is that he was no worst that some in his own time, and he was harder on poor Southern whites than on blacks and Jews. That pretty much puts him in my defintition. He was a man of misanthropic animosities and doesn’t deserve, at least, my respect. John . |
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Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
quote: Indeed, and the fact that he could write makes him extremely interesting. I've never really understood how you can call a misanthrope a racist and a bigot. Your own post points to the fact that he hated everybody -- just not always equally. |
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rwood Member Elite
since 2000-02-29
Posts 3793Tennessee |
When picked apart, all of our secret/public imperfections removed, much of what's left will always be ass in someone's eyes. |
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Huan Yi Member Ascendant
since 2004-10-12
Posts 6688Waukegan |
. Brad, He made exception for some High Germans of which he considered himself one. He considered war good for strengthening and purging the species of weaknesses. He kept silent on what was happening in Germany though he could see for himself what was coming during a trip he made to it in 1938. As to both World War I and II he felt the United States had backed the wrong side. . |
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Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Perhaps, Vidal says it best: quote: I'm not going to defend Mencken further. He was all the things you say he was (but not, of course, a supporter of national socialism), but I am truly happy for this thread. It's a perfect opportunity to quote from Mencken as much as I like. Mencken on democracy: quote: |
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Huan Yi Member Ascendant
since 2004-10-12
Posts 6688Waukegan |
Brad, “ Politically, he is often right but seldom correct by today's stern standards. In a cheery way, he dislikes most minorities and if he ever had a good word to say about the majority of his countrymen, I have yet to come across it. Recently, when his letters were published, it was discovered that He Did Not Like the Jews, and that he had said unpleasant things about them not only as individuals but In General, plainly the sign of a Hitler-Holocaust enthusiast. . . I do not believe in democracy, but I am perfectly willing to admit that it provides the only really amusing form of government ever endured by mankind. ‘ Are you then to suggest that however a deplorable example as a human being ,so long as he’s good at the craft for which he was/is well paid we should understand if not embrace him? By the way he said that if all the Dust Bowl farmers and Southern sharecroppers immediately died or were killed off the rest of America would be better for it. John |
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Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
I am saying that we should read him. What you decide to do after that is your own business. quote: --Mencken |
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Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
quote: --Mencken quote: --Shakespeare Are you up in arms over these as well? |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
John, You are right. I shall say that Mencken is rotten meat because he had no heart for his human fellas. A rotten meat...however rotten, will attract flies and butteredflies. Also many people want to know him simply because we do not read out those interesting charactors from ordinary people. After all, he had his voice back then. and history only preserves these extremists...for 15 minutes or 50 years. |
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Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
quote: |
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Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
quote: quote: |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
One can never expect to find ivory in a dog's mouth. He was indeed talking nonsense. Twice civilized language could not tame the beast's tongue. |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
Mencken is not a naked man. He were in a skin of wolf to cover his own scared soul. |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
"After all, all he did was string together a lot of old, well-known quotations." H. L. Mencken, on Shakespeare [This message has been edited by TomMark (08-10-2007 01:01 AM).] |
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hush Senior Member
since 2001-05-27
Posts 1653Ohio, USA |
I don't know, the quotes on women (particularly the first one) seem pretty spot on... Just because someone is an ass, does that make the truth less so when it comes from his mouth? I think it's important to view the art both in context and out of context of the artist. This may be a bad example, but I think Courtney Love is a trainwreck of a disaster of a person... and her songwriting is too painfully obviously influenced by those around her- but that doesn't stop me from thinking "Live Through This" is one of the best albums I've ever heard. |
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Huan Yi Member Ascendant
since 2004-10-12
Posts 6688Waukegan |
. “Marriage: the end of hope." "Love: the delusion that one woman is different from another. “ “Bachelors know more about women than married men; if they didn't they'd be married too.” H. L. Mencken . |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
0 Huan “Marriage: the end of hope." Does that mean that marriage ends hope or marriage is the result of hope? whoevver cut this verse out....hello, not every hope is marriage related. "Love: the delusion that one woman is different from another. “ Love from women including love from 1. Mother 2. grandmather 3 Aunts 4. Sisters 5. female friends 6. colleagues 7. wives 8. daughters 9 granddaughters Mencken was old enough to tell the differences. “Bachelors know more about women than married men; if they didn't they'd be married too.” obviously "bachelors" of his kind are those men who had given everything including selfesteem, dignity and integrity to women due to stupidity. Good women do not take those from men. And they went through all of this, still had no idea about women.... |
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Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
quote: --Marion Elizabeth Rogers quote: --Mencken |
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Huan Yi Member Ascendant
since 2004-10-12
Posts 6688Waukegan |
. And guess who played with dogs . . . Mencken led and fostered an attitude of contempt. To praise him then, given he would almost no doubt have extended that scorn to the worshiper is a form of pathetic intellectual masochism, ( and if that were a quote from the great H. L. many would bow their heads). By the way, he felt that England and France, even more the United States, should not concern themselves with Germany solving its backyard problems with the Czechs and the Poles. He in fact regretted his ancestors having moved from Germany. . |
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Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
quote: Indeed, and the scorn would have been well earned. My best friend is a lawyer. One day, a casual day I am told, he wore a T-shirt with "Kill all the lawyers" to his firm. He was immediately excoriated by a female colleague for encouraging such attitudes. Some people just never get it. Why do you search for a messiah in the words of a journalist? |
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rwood Member Elite
since 2000-02-29
Posts 3793Tennessee |
"Some people just never get it." True, but I feel he honed cynicism and sarcasm with an art that most people can only cartoon with any guts. I'm not saying I support or admire his every word. I'm saying he's a twist of lime in the vanilla Corona'd writing world. quote: Personally, I'm guilty of being a bibliobibuli at times, but I'm not able to own up to that word while drunk on anything else. Blibliobliboolo bliblioblublub. Correction: Delivery is tough while sober, as well. |
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Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Not every word, of course. quote: I like this. quote: Isn't that the key? That we see as much of ourselves in the victims as we do the victimizer. |
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Huan Yi Member Ascendant
since 2004-10-12
Posts 6688Waukegan |
. "Why do you search for a messiah in the words of a journalist?" I don't but he was something like that for those who considered themselves the elite in the 1920's and for some time beyond and therefore influenced the attitudes of an era. . |
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TomMark Member Elite
since 2007-07-27
Posts 2133LA,CA |
Brad, I know what you mean. Tomtoo |
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rwood Member Elite
since 2000-02-29
Posts 3793Tennessee |
"Isn't that the key? That we see as much of ourselves in the victims as we do the victimizer." Yep, or the "characters" as much as the "author", etc. being believable must have a strong aspect of humanity attached, whether that be a respectable or deplorable trait. I think it's important that we see ourselves, even in the events of the deplorable. It helps me stay away from that role if I don't like myself in that particular characterization. Consistency is key to me. At least then I know who or what I'm dealing with. Mencken was consistent. I once had a friend who was an "upstanding" woman of society. She was all about reputation, good deeds, community involvement, class, refinement, etc. I found out her father was an illegal gun dealer who operated out of a liquor store and was a high member of the KKK. It seems she spent her life trying to stamp out the seeds her father planted, but she let one grow into a strangling vine: Prejudice. That's what made her whole life unbelievable to me. Her good deeds were a liquor store front for her father's bad seed, and she could never own up to it in public. This made her inconsistent and fragile in her loyalty as a friend, to me. Sorry if it seems I'm passing judgment, but actually she judged me as unworthy of her friendship because I felt my friends were worth more to me than being called "the black people," (or worse) behind their backs. We parted ways, and I lost her "influence" among certain social circles, but I'm consistently hopeful she'll stray one day, free from the thing that she shackled herself to her father with. Whatever is written/exposed isn't always a revealing. That's why I appreciate it when it is, even if I disagree. |
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Huan Yi Member Ascendant
since 2004-10-12
Posts 6688Waukegan |
. There is something in the Western mentality that insists on being the sinner. The ones, who guilty, are deserving of blame. A sort of cultural Mia Culpa without which there is no salvation. . |
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Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
On the contrary, the villification of the other is an attempt at exculpation. Villifying culture, even if it's your own, is simply one more method of exculpation. Personally, the idea that 'we must feel guilty' can be countered in two ways: either it is wrong and history is ignored and/or twisted, or it is accepted but tempered with a little humor. I prefer the latter. Mencken's writing depends on the interaction between the two. |
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