Life, 1909-04-08 · page 13 of 32
Life — April 8, 1909 — page 13: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page from *Life* magazine satirizes social dynamics through the phrase "The Worm Will Turn," a proverb meaning even the meek will eventually rebel. The main cartoon depicts five figures in sequence: a man in a suit (left) observing women in increasingly animated states of agitation or movement, their dresses and hair swirling dramatically. The progression suggests escalating female assertiveness or resistance to male authority. The accompanying illustration shows a figure discovering a giant's pitchfork, with the caption "Oh, Papa; Look What We've Found! Some Giant's Hay-Fork!" The page's definition of "History" below critiques how historical accounts depend on perspective and repeatability rather than objective truth—suggesting the cartoon comments on shifting power dynamics and how narratives change depending on who tells them.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
|, PAPA; LOOK WHAT WE'VE FOUND! SOME GIANT'S MAY- History ISTORY is a running account of how King Somebody-or- other either did or did not get to a certain place, which nobody ever heard of, before King Somebody-else got there, from which we are usually supposed to conclude that it would have made quite a difference whether he did or not. Like nearly everything else, history has two sides. The History of the Garden of Eden depends upon whether it is related by a man or a woman. The History of the American Revolution reads quite different in English books from the way it reads in our own books. The History of the Civil War depends upon which side of the Mason and Dixon Line you happen to be sitting when you write it. History is a bore, not only because you are unacquainted with the people who figure in it, but because it repeats itself. Ellis 0. Jones.