H. L. Mencken Quotes:
Ocupation: Journalist
Life: September 12, 1880 - January 29, 1956
Birthday: September 12
Death: January 29
An author, like any other so-called artist, is a man in whom the normal vanity of all men is so vastly exaggerated that he finds it a sheer impossibility to hold it in. His over-powering impulse is to gyrate before his fellow men, flapping his wings and emitting defiant yells. This being forbidden by the police of all civilized nations, he takes it out by putting his yells on paper. Such is the thing called self-expression.
source: H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.466, Vintage
topic: Men, Artist, Self, Flapping, Civilized Nations
