In The Collected Drama of H. L. Mencken Plays and Criticism S. T. Joshi has assembled for the first time Menckenamprsquos dramatic works comprising six oneact plays and the lengthy threeact play Heliogabalus. These plays which have never been reprinted since their original appearances in newspapers or in Menckenamprsquos early volume A Book of Burlesques 1916 exhibit Menckenamprsquos penchant for satire and ridicule. The second half of this book features a selection of Menckenamprsquos early writings 1905ampndash17 on drama most of which have never been reprinted. Various essays on Shakespeare Shaw Synge Strindberg Ibsen and others exhibit Menckenamprsquos keenness as a literary critic and his understanding of the aesthetic possibilities of the drama.