Life, 1891-04-16 · page 13 of 14
Life — April 16, 1891 — page 13: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This *Life* magazine page contains theater reviews and two separate satirical cartoons mocking social attitudes of the era. **Top section:** Reviews of Broadway plays, including "Betrothed" at the Garden Theatre, which attempts to challenge heredity theory—a scientific debate of the period. **"A Man with Aspirations":** A husband-wife joke about Wagner's music. She romanticizes it as transcendent; he darkly jokes he wishes it could make the orchestra disappear—a jab at both Wagner's notoriously long operas and artistic pretension. **"An Ethical Point":** A fiancé complains that his future father-in-law is gambling away money that should be reserved for the son-in-law's inheritance. The satire mocks the mercenary logic of marriage arrangements among the wealthy—the fiancé's concern isn't moral outrage at gambling, but indignation that family money meant to benefit *him* is being risked.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
- LIFE: 245 The other characters are well sustained, particularly that of Col, Rocket and the Countess of Pompion. Altogether the performance is interesting, and after the mass of dramatic foolishness seen on New York's stages this winter, most refreshing. . . . ‘© DETROTHED,” at the Garden Theatre, has as artistic a setting as any in New York for some time. Alphonse Daudet's attempt to explode the theory of heredity is not entirely successful, and a society play seems a strange channel for such an effort. A MAN WITH ASPIRATIONS, AT LEAST. HE: Isn't Wagner's music wonderful? Don’t you think it seems to have the power of carrying the hearer away from this world to some other for the time? HE: No. I've often wished it could affect me or the orchestra that way. AN ETHECAL POINT. La Fiancée: 1 AM SORRY TO HEAR PAPA IS SPECULATING SO HEAVILY, Le Fiancé: BY Jove! I 18 ALMOST CRIMINAL FOR A MAN TO SPECULATE WITH MONEY THAT OUGHT TO BE SAVED FOR HIS SON-IN-LAW, comicbooks.com