Life, 1911-11-16 · page 17 of 44
Life — November 16, 1911 — page 17: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This satirical cartoon from *Life* magazine mocks the romantic ideal of marrying a "genius." Two women converse in an elegant interior: Mrs. B. warns her friend Myrtle against marrying a man of genius, despite claiming happiness with her own husband. Myrtle's confused response—"I thought you'd always been ideally happy"—reveals the contradiction, and Mrs. B.'s awkward deflection ("Yes, I—er—I have") suggests her marriage is actually miserable. The satire targets the era's romanticization of genius and artistic temperament. The title invokes the proverb structure to argue that even brilliant men make difficult husbands. The cartoon criticizes both the myth of the tortured genius and women's resignation to unhappy marriages, presented as a wry commentary on matrimonial reality versus social pretense.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
NO MAN IS AN OLD MASTER TO HIS WIFE Mrs. B.: TAKE MY ADVICE, MY DEAR, DON’T BECOME THE WIFE oF A GENIUS. Myrtle: nut—t THOUGHT YOU MAD ALWAYS BEEN IDEALLY MAPPY WITH YOUR MUSBAND? “yrs, I—ER—1 Mave.’ comicbooks.com