After 1908 Mencken made a stir in American letters as literary critic of the Smart Set magazine, of which he became coeditor with George Jean Nathan from 1914 to 1923. With biting humor he defended naturalists such as Theodore Dreiser and satirists such as Sinclair Lewis, while sarcastically opposing the genteel tradition in such authors as William Dean Howells and Henry James. He also baited reformers and their banning of "immoral" literature from the mail and from libraries. Thus, he won a following of students, artists, and journalists eager for a fruition of the fin de siecle revolt against Victorian standards in art, thought, and morality. In 1924 he continued to lead the intellectual rebellion as coeditor with Nathan of the American Mercury, though his interest in literature declined as it grew in ideas and institutions. (Nathan's relationship with the magazine ended in August 1925, and Mencken continued as editor until December 1933.) In 1926 Mencken added to his national notoriety by openly getting himself arrested in Boston for publicly selling the so-called "Hatrack" number of the American Mercury (April 1926). It had been outlawed there because it included Herbert Asbury's story "Hatrack," about a small-town prostitute.
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