H. L. Mencken presents master styling in A Book of Prefaces (1917), Damn! (1918), and The American Credo (1920). Prefaces is a book of literary criticism containing the essays "Joseph Conrad," "Theodore Dreiser," "James Huneker," and "Puritanism as a Literary Force." He hoped that "they may at least blow a wind through the prevailing fogs, and reveal what is sound and important in some first-rate books." The ensuing intellectual battle energized a generation. Damn! A Book of Calumny contains some of Menckens wittier turns in its forty-nine short essays. It has been mined for anthologies, but it has never before been reprinted as a whole. The American Credo: A Contribution Toward the Interpretation of the National Mind contains four hundred and eighty-eight articles, co-written by drama critic George Jean Nathan, about American popular belief.
