H.L. Mencken
Firebrand journalist and author Henry Louis Mencken co-founded one of the pulp eraís classic magazines, BlackMask Black Mask, as well as ParisienneMonthlyMagazine Parisienne Monthly Magazine and SaucyStories Saucy Stories. This trio of pulps was created solely to support his slick paper Smart Set, a faultering attempt to replicate the success of the Atlantic Monthly.
Background
H.L. MenckenBorn: Sept. 12, 1880
Died: Jan. 29, 1956
By 1915, Mencken and Nathan had an abundance of manuscripts and decided to use in a pulp paper magazine those that did not make the grade for Smart Set. The pair founded a magazine for ìthe morons,î ParisienneMonthlyMagazine Parisienne Monthly Magazine, a 15-cent pulp with stories and novelettes set in the European city. Mencken and Nathan followed ParisienneMonthlyMagazine Parisienne with SaucyStories Saucy Stories in 1916, and four years later, in 1920, with BlackMask Black Mask.
Clearly, Mencken detested the low-brow pulps, including his own, despite them being moneymaking engines that helped support his literary magazine aspirations. He referred to them as the ìlouse magazinesî and described the crime fiction published in BlackMask Black Mask as ìhomicidal fiction.î
Less than a year after BlackMask Black Maskís debut, Mencken and Nathan got out of the pulp field by selling the three magazines to their partners in the Smart Set Co. for $60,000 ó $20,000 for ParisienneMonthlyMagazine Parisienne Monthly Magazine and SaucyStories Saucy Stories, and $40,000 for BlackMask Black Mask. Mencken described the income from the sale as sufficient ìto relieve Nathan and me from want permanently.î
