Life, 1899-03-09 · page 20 of 20
Life — March 9, 1899 — page 20: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This satirical piece attacks **Joseph Pulitzer**, editor of the *New York World*, one of Life magazine's rival publications. The caricature exaggerates Pulitzer's accent and coarse language to portray him as vulgar and vindictive. The text mocks Pulitzer by claiming he has "done more harm to morals...than any other living man" and that he uses sensationalism to degrade American culture. The article then performs an ironic reversal: it presents Pulitzer's (fictional) bitter complaint that *Life* magazine has harmed his circulation—using his own words against him. The satire's point: reading *Life* signals refinement and respectability, while reading Pulitzer's *World* marks you as someone lacking taste. This was typical **magazine war** content of the 1890s, when competing publications attacked each other mercilessly. The exaggerated dialect and accent emphasize class contempt alongside the editorial rivalry.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
STRENGTH OF | GIBRALTAR [ a Liberal and Profitable Life Insurance Policies for Indi- viduals and Business Firms The best of all that is good in Life Insurance Amounts, $15 to $50,000 Premiums payable Yearly, Hall-Yearly, Quarterly, or Weekly, Profit-Sharing Prudential Policies HES PRUDENTIAL CE COMPANY IMERICA' Bie) ot pn Fo Dryden: Pres.__Home Office: NeworhiNd 1899 are the best wheels we have ever made. PRICE $40 the lowest price Rambler grade will stand. Gormelty & Jeftery Miz.Co. 34 8 Your Health $ @ semands bicycle riding; but the @ greatest pleasure and benefit will @ only come if you ride the ° Waverley § $ 3 Bieyole AO) ¢ ives troubte, Catalogue gives particulars.—Write for It. @ indiana Bicycte Co., Indianapolis, Ind. @ OUR WORST EDITOR. JOSEPH PULITZER, AND HIS OPINION OF LIFE. The editor of the» Wor/d is known wherever bad English is read, and depraved minds every- where hail him as a source of inspiration. He has probably done more harm to morals, and has fostered with more real persistency the rapid undergrowth of American degeneracy than any other living man. What he might say of Lire is therefore of great interest: “Don’ speag to me of Lire. Dot paper is der worst ever, ain't it? Ven de Suz un Churnal un udder file sheets gome out against me, I laf ha-ha! Vat does it madder? But Lire! Dot paper goes to der very peoples dot I vould buy nyeella a place among, because of my monish, un day vill not have me, Hah! It has cut into my cirgulation also, un made me a laughing stock. It makes me sick. Speag to me not of Lire.” Mr. Pulitzer's views, though not new, may | |well bear reiterating, showing, as they do, that no refined family of taste can afford not to take Lire regularly. Contrast the shame-faced indi- vidual with some grains of self-respect left who stealthily endeavors to conceal a copy of the World from sight, and the proud bearing of the man who spreads his Lire where all may see the company he keeps. Merely to be seen with Faced Cloths in New Spring Shades. Scotch and Irish Suitings, Cycle and Golf Cloths, Meltons and Venetians. Proadeoay Ks 198 ot. NEW YORK, get their heads to- & gether that the verdict is going to be in favor of Whitman's Chocolates and Confections They aro famous wherever there exists an appetite for pure, delicious candy. Sold everywhere. Whitman's Instantancous Chocolate a copy of Lire is a good mind advertisement. Look out for Colds, Covsts, Grippe and Pneumecis Keep a supply of “OLD CROW RYE’ in the house. It has oer been equaled. KIRK & CO,