Life, 1917-01-18 · page 9 of 40
Life — January 18, 1917 — page 9: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a satirical illustration titled "Portrait of Professor Brayne Returning Home After Delivering a Lecture on the Brotherhood of Man." The cartoon depicts an intellectual (the "Professor," identifiable by his top hat) arriving home by carriage, surrounded by what appear to be his family members or household occupants. The satire targets the hypocrisy of someone who publicly lectures about universal human brotherhood and equality while maintaining conventional Victorian social hierarchies in his private life. The accompanying text discusses soldiers' letters expressing views about post-war peace and democratic governance, suggesting the cartoon comments on the gap between idealistic public rhetoric and actual social practice—a common Life magazine theme. The satire implies that such elevated philosophizing about human unity rings hollow when one's own domestic arrangements reflect rigid class and gender distinctions.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
PORTRAIT OF PROFESSOR BRAYNE RETURNING HOME AFTER DELIVERING A LECTURE ON THE though he has reared on his founda- tion an imposing edifice, it may come Lown on him some time I a Way to surprise. He who lives by the scare- head may perish by it, and in one way or another usually does. But North- cliffe is for England and the Allies, and, in his way, he is a strong man. One reads occasionally, nowadays, in soldiers’ letters and other war liter- ature intimations that in all the bel- ligerent nations the views of soldiers BROTHERHOOD OF MAN fighting at the front are no longer in full harmony with the views of per- sons at home Who are urging on the war. If the fighters get increasingly tired of fighting and dying, while the talkers continue valiant, there may come some fine day a democratic move- ment that will be quite independent of headlines and printing presses, and that will end the war on terms satisfactory to what is Ieft of the men who are fighting it. In such a case as that Kaisers and newspaper dictators might have to for it. It would be Nery Wwleresting, and Though no cau tious forecaster would say it is proba- ble, this war which has so flabbergasted have in still run precedent, may store greater astonishments than it has yet The soldiers in it have not One hears, that the Ger- Perhaps, disclosed. yet spoken. man soldiers want peace. some day, they will demand it. E. S. M. comicbooks.com