Life — October 20, 1904 — page 10: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

# Explanation for Modern Readers These two panels from *Life* magazine (copyright 1901) satirize gentlemen's social behavior. The top panel, "Being One of the Boys," shows a young man joining an established group of well-dressed men at what appears to be a social gathering or club. The bottom panel, "He Explains to Messrs. Rounder and Bounder What a Devil of a Fellow He Is," depicts the same young man boasting to two men at a table, apparently exaggerating his own wildness or mischievous character. The satire targets social pretension—specifically how men attempt to gain acceptance by performing toughness or rakishness. The names "Rounder" and "Bounder" (period slang for dissolute men) emphasize that this fellow is imitating disreputable behavior to seem sophisticated to his peers.