Judge, 1925-01-31 · page 13 of 36
Judge — January 31, 1925 — page 13: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page satirizes how different celebrated American writers would tell the same basic joke—a man's wife interrupts him at a show, and he makes an awkward excuse. The satire mimics the distinctive styles of: - **Ring Lardner**: colloquial, rambling sports-writer vernacular - **Edgar Lee Masters**: melancholic free verse evoking his *Spoon River Anthology* - **Walt Mason**: sentimental, moralizing verse - **Gelett Burgess**: affected, archaic ("prithee") - **A.R. Bosworth**: brief, pointed commentary on bobbed hair (a 1920s trend) The page mocks these writers' recognizable mannerisms while exploring how the same mundane domestic situation—a husband caught with another woman at a theater—gets filtered through different literary voices. The bottom cartoon about cigarettes appears unrelated. The humor relies on readers recognizing these authors' actual writing styles.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
is = | | if | 4 | | | | | | 3 ] i ] i The Oldest Joke in the World As it would be told by Ring Lardner: “Frienp AL: “Well, Al, they was a guy pulls a wise crack on me to-day, but I cracks right back at him which shows I ain't such a dumb-bell myself, hey. Al? This bird walks up to me and says who was the lady you was out to the show with last night, and I says I wasn’t out with any lady on acct. of having to take the wife to the show. Maybe that ain't getting back at him, hey, AI? “Jack Keere.” Edgar Lee Masters would have it thus: I always tried to be a lady, a my-w Though I was married. | And how I loved him! | He took me to every show that came to Spoon River. And I tried to be a But, oh! the bitter d when I heard him say: lady, that was my wife I died of a broken heart. A CORNER IN HE redit to him. Husionment Phat was no 0 think they're in heaven. And Walt Mason would ripple out. Walt, this lady looks familiar quite, “My neighbor ps n the street I ween, and I have seen her f and takes me by the hand, and friends like him are hard to beat in “T never saw a lady, now, this, our native land. He says: ‘I Perhaps I'll never see one; But I can tell One's wife in books, or mayhap on the serec “And then [answer him in to sadnes i Gelett Burgess might say: of and ir. “That was no the show, next to a lady friend. oan, ‘my wife has our seats Were ina center row, bobbed her hair! rn bucks thepair. But, prithee, ALR. Bosworth ou, anyhow ‘an never be one!” Zz | “If I smoked so many cigarettes as that fella I'd be worried.” | o } al comicbooks.com