ABSTRACT
In 1921, H.L. Mencken rather colourfully recounted how he had set upon the task of reading the works of Thorstein Veblen:
I managed to get through the whole infernal job. I read “The Theory of the Leisure Class”, I read “The Theory of Business Enterprise”, and then I read “The Instinct of Workmanship.” An hiatus followed; I was racked by severe neuralgia, with delusions of persecution. On recovering I tackled “Imperial Germany and the Industrial Revolution.” Malaria for a month, and then “The Nature of the Peace and the Terms of Its Perpetuation.” What ensued was never diagnosed; probably it was some low infection of the mesentery or spleen. When it passed off, leaving only an asthmatic cough, I read “The Higher Learning in America.” And then went to Mt Clemens to drink the Glauber’s salts. Eureka! The business was done! It had strained me, but now it was over.
(Mencken 1921: 64–65) Those familiar with Veblen’s works would readily identify the inspiration for Mencken’s passage. Mencken is of course referring to Veblen’s ‘unique’ style of writing, which he goes on to describe as “almost unbelievable tediousness and flatulence”, leading him to dismiss Veblen’s ideas as “quite simple, and often anything but revolutionary in essence” (Mencken 1921: 65–66). Indeed, Mencken goes further, claiming that “practically the whole system of Prof. Dr. Veblen was in his first book and his last…. Read these two, and you won’t have to read the others” (Mencken 1921: 65).