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47th out of 101 books
—
31 voters
A Religious Orgy in Tennessee: A Reporter's Account of the Scopes Monkey Trial
by
H.L. Mencken
"The native American Voltaire, the enemy of all puritans, the heretic in the Sunday school, the one-man demolition crew of the genteel tradition." -Alistair Cooke on H.L. Mencken
Fiercely intelligent, scathingly honest, and hysterically funny, H.L. Mencken’s coverage of the Scopes Monkey Trial so galvanized the nation that it eventually inspired a Broadway play and the clas...more
Fiercely intelligent, scathingly honest, and hysterically funny, H.L. Mencken’s coverage of the Scopes Monkey Trial so galvanized the nation that it eventually inspired a Broadway play and the clas...more
Paperback, 232 pages
Published
September 1st 2006
by Melville House
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Mar 06, 2009
Michael
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
those who like their journalism on tap
_A Religious Orgy in Tennessee_ is a minefield surrounded by a barbed wire fence in the middle of a volcano on the outskirts of another minefield.
There are only a handfull of writers whose style I would actively attempt to plagiarise if I were not a better person: Henry Louis Mencken is near the top.
Mencken really did not like Bryan in any way; his relationship to the old fundy is very similar to that between Hunter Thompson and Dick Nixon. Most of the reportage herein is confined to vitriolic...more
There are only a handfull of writers whose style I would actively attempt to plagiarise if I were not a better person: Henry Louis Mencken is near the top.
Mencken really did not like Bryan in any way; his relationship to the old fundy is very similar to that between Hunter Thompson and Dick Nixon. Most of the reportage herein is confined to vitriolic...more
Mencken brings an old school style of reporting, one quite free with subjective assertions and biased judgments, but entertaining and not without its charm. He’s right about the science but that is not an argument he is making because the science is a fact to him and arguing for its rightness would be a waste of effort. No, he’s on the attack against Fundamentalists, country yokels to him who have every right to their ignorance but shouldn’t be allowed to rally behind mountebanks like William Je...more
The subtitle says it all: a reporter's account of the Scopes Monkey Trial (a name, by the way, coined by H.L. himself). There is a particularly wonderful essay in which Mencken describes with anthropological awe the proceedings of a Baptists faith-healing.
H.L. Mencken has long been listed among America's most brilliant and infamous journalists and iconoclasts, and after having read this collection of articles it is easy to see why. The writing is superb and not a single sentence goes by that won't make you stop and think. While this collection centers around the articles Mencken wrote during the Scopes Monkey Trial the actual content and ideas explored are both timeless and timely, given today's still very hot debate over creationism being taught...more
Despite what the tag says, I didn't finish this book. Mencken seems to be a little in the tone of what Mark Twain once said about Wagner: he has some great moments, but horrible quarters of an hour.
When vitriolic attacks against the pious and ignorant exhaust even me, then you know that something's going on. The religious factions who backed the anti-Darwin law that inspired the Scopes trial certainly represent the worst in the American character. But so too do Mencken's tirades, which are often...more
When vitriolic attacks against the pious and ignorant exhaust even me, then you know that something's going on. The religious factions who backed the anti-Darwin law that inspired the Scopes trial certainly represent the worst in the American character. But so too do Mencken's tirades, which are often...more
Fiercely intelligent, scathingly honest, and hysterically funny, H.L. Mencken’s coverage of the Scopes Monkey Trial so galvanized the nation that it eventually inspired a Broadway play and the classic Hollywood movie Inherit the Wind.
Mencken’s no-nonsense sensibility is still exciting: his perceptive rendering of the courtroom drama; his piercing portrayals of key figures Scopes, Clarence Darrow, and William Jennings Bryan; his ferocious take on the fundamentalist culture surrounding it all—inc...more
Mencken’s no-nonsense sensibility is still exciting: his perceptive rendering of the courtroom drama; his piercing portrayals of key figures Scopes, Clarence Darrow, and William Jennings Bryan; his ferocious take on the fundamentalist culture surrounding it all—inc...more
Scathing. But not really. Reading this is like being at a business meeting and you know what’s going on and no one says it but HL does with the utmost clarity. But he equally loathes falseness of all coats, legal or not. It makes sense the guy from the HBO show The Wire was a newsman from Baltimore.
Sep 23, 2010
Craig J.
added it
A Religious Orgy in Tennessee: A Reporter's Account of the Scopes Monkey Trial by H.L. Mencken (2006)
This book contains a lot of ranting. But as a collection of political editorials from 1925, it's enlightening the extent to which nothing has changed in 85 years.
Its relevance today is startling.
Mencken's vitriol is a wonderful departure from the current attempts at "objective journalism" in today's media. He's a pure bastard in all the right ways, turning himself into part of the struggle (whether or not it's completely accurate) and his opposition into empty demagogues (whether or not it's completely warranted). Without Mencken and the Scopes trial, we wouldn't have Hunter S. Thompson or Warren Ellis.
Oct 11, 2007
Zach
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
anyone interested in the ID/evolution drama
Shelves:
philosophyandreligion
Includes all the articles H.L. Mencken wrote during the Scopes Monkey Trial (the basis for the play and movie Inherit the Wind). At the end of the book there's a transcript of Darrow's entire cross-examination of William Jennings Bryant. It's amazing to read, though not as intense as I expected. It's more amazing that the Creationism debate is still going on...
Jul 19, 2007
Mel Hogg
added it
A great overview of the trial. Mencken is delightfully scathing. Darrow's cross examination of Bryan was not as damaging as I expected, but still amusing. I can't believe this argument is still going on more than 75 years after the Scopes trial...
May 19, 2013
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Henry Louis "H.L." Mencken became one of the most influential and prolific journalists in America in the 1920s and '30s, writing about all the shams and con artists in the world. He attacked chiropractors and the Ku Klux Klan, politicians and other journalists. Most of all, he attacked Puritan morality. He called Puritanism, "the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy."
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