Life, 1896-04-23 · page 6 of 20
Life — April 23, 1896 — page 6: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis This page contains a literary essay on George Borrow's "Lavengro," praising its "persistent and unexpected charm" despite being rambling and commercially unmarketable. The piece advocates for Macmillan's reprint series that includes classics like "Peter Simple," "Pride and Prejudice," and "Sybil." The two framed illustrations are Victorian-era portrait paintings—not political cartoons. They depict: (1) the author's married sister wearing a coronet at the opera, with her husband in background, and (2) the author's brother Charles, "the Yale man," about to make a touchdown. These appear to be humorous personal anecdotes about family members rather than social satire. The bottom joke about funeral timing is unrelated office humor.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
326 *LIFE: HISTORICAL PORTRAIT PAINTING, WITH APPROPRIATE FRAMES. (A few leaves from the catalogue of a private portrait gallery.) WHY NOT ADOPT THE INTERESTING CUSTOM OF OUR ANCESTORS FROM “LAVENGRO” TO “ TOMMY TODDLES.” F one wishes to know how the fashion in letters changes from decade to decade, let him take up ‘ Lavengro,” by George Borrow. It is accounted one of the classics, and yet if Borrow should have fallen upon these times of ‘‘ smart” books he would have surely failed of a publisher. He would have been told that, while his book is exceedingly well written and full of observation, it is so rambling, inconse- quent and long-drawn out that the public would not buy it in quantities to justify it as a commercial venture. Moreover, it is probable that, if he had been persistent, some young man, fresh from a study of French models, would have told him that his passages of ‘fine writing" are entirely out of key with present standards of taste. And yet no book has a better right to be in the series of choice reprints that Macmillans are issuing—in such select company as ‘Peter Simple,” ‘Pride and Prejudice” and “Sybil.” You will read ‘‘ Lavengro” not for an emotional debauch, but for its persistent and unexpected charm. Its leisurely vagaries, its quiet humor, and quaint characters PORTRAIT OF MY ELDEST MARRIED SISTER WITH HER CORONET ON, POXTRAIT OF HER HUSBAND IN THE BACKGROUND, but this quality of transparent trickiness is so frankly accepted as the high standard of the Society that criti- cism is at once disarmed—that is, criticism based on composition, drawings, values or harmonies of color. Judged from its own point of view the exhibit is a vociferous success. The great majority of the paintings are out of drawing, offensive in color and exquisitely false in effect, but as the production of these impressions saves a vast amount of labor and as the style is obviously in favor among the controlling spirits of the Society, it would be manifestly unwise for the ambitious young artist to aim at anything higher. Jo AM. PINK, PARIS. 1896. a GRAY- PARKER, . DELINEAVIT, SPECIFIED. AD OF FIRM: What time does that funeral you ant to go to this afternoon take place? PORTRAIT OF MY BROTHER CHARLES, THE YALE MAN, ABOUT Cierk: It is called at half-past three, sir. TO MAKE A TOUCH-DOWN. Comicbooks.com