Life, 1899-02-02 · page 13 of 20
Life — February 2, 1899 — page 13: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains theatrical criticism and two unrelated satirical cartoons. **Top Section:** A review of actress Olga Nethersole's performance in the play *Paula*. The critic (Metcalfe) compares her to Mrs. Kendal, arguing that while Nethersole's hysterical, perpetually-in-motion performance is more realistic, she wastes her talent on artificiality rather than serious art—like a spendthrift squandering an inheritance. **"The Wrong Qualification" cartoon:** A kindergarten principal rejects a woman applicant who has raised ten children of her own, saying she would "upset all our ideas." This satirizes institutional rigidity: the school's theoretical methods are valued over actual parenting experience, mocking the disconnect between academic pedagogy and practical childcare. **"Driving a Bargain" illustration:** A humorous scene of a horse trade negotiation. The page reflects early 20th-century attitudes about women, theater, education, and the tension between tradition and practical competence.
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Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
«And both were young. have made her eccentric and unstrung under her misfortunes, but in the majority of cases the effect of her life and surround. ings would have been in the line of depression and its attend- ant sobriety of demeanour. But what is bizarre and unusual scems to appeal to this actress, and her Paula is a woman whose emotions are hysterical in their expression. She carries Mrs. Kendal’s practice of keeping herself constantly busied while on the stage to greater extremes than does even that estimable person, and her perpetual motion keeps her audience in a state of nervous unrest almost as wearisome as her own. But her performance as a whole is a better one than Mrs. Ken- dal’s. The latter was brutal and, so to speak, beefy. The very nervousness of which we complain brings Miss Nether- sole’s creation more within the range of reality. Mrs. Kendal's Paula would probably have gone off and got drunk as a relief from her troubles. Miss Nethersole’s Paula would have done nothing other than what the author provided—committed suicide by poison as a relief from the false position to which she found herself condemned. In contemplating the use to which Miss Nether- sole puts her unquestioned abilities, one has much the same fecling of pity that one has in witnessing the spendthrift recklessly wasting his inheritance. She is richly endowed by nature, but, instead of using her gifts to their best udvantage, she is squandering them on artificiality instead of art. Metcalfe. SOLOMON AND THE QUEEN OF suEDA. “Thou hast ravisbed me with one of thine eyes.” The Wrong Qualification. RINCIPAL (of kindergarten school): Have you had any experience with young children? App1icantT For Teacuer: I've raised ten of them myself. What! A mother! You wouldn't do atall. You would upset all our ideas.” V E shall probably expand first and think afterwards. “ DRIVING A BARGAIN, comicbooks.com