Life, 1918-01-03 · page 24 of 40
Life — January 3, 1918 — page 24: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This satirical piece uses a year-end auction metaphor to mock 1918's disappointments. The poem "For Sale—A Year!" by Sophie Redford personifies the departing year as damaged goods—broken vows, failed hopes, sunken ships, and ammunition—being liquidated cheaply. It's bitter commentary on a year marked by WWI's devastation and social upheaval. The second section, "Adieu!," announces *The Masses* magazine's suspension, characterizing it as destructively radical rather than meaningfully critical. Life's editors argue the publication, which printed blasphemous content about the Virgin Mary, deserved suppression—conflating free speech infringement with Bolshevik violence in Russia. The cartoons (scale-tipping and mud-digging) appear illustrative of these themes of imbalance and excavation, though their specific references are unclear without additional context.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
‘LIFE: For Sale—A Year! ‘OR SALE—A Year! Come, now, consider! A whole year—to the highest bidder! A year of figures, facts and fancies, Caprices, whims and rich romances, At auction! Ah! It makes us weep To see it going—and so cheap! A rummage sale! Of half-worn pleasures, Of broken vows and faded treasures, Of misfit hopes and aspirations! Why, just a few slight alterations, With patches here and there a few, And they would be almost like new! A remnant sale! The date remember. It is the last week in December, When odds and ends of time are going, And these choice moments we are showing Are far too cheap at any price. It is, you know, a sacrifice! , ale! Of lives now blighted. Of bitter wrongs that could be righted! \ sale of strifes and coalitions! Of sunken ships, and ammunitions! Our lease expires! The rent is due! We'll trade the Old Year for the New. Sophie Redford. Adieu! ME MASSES has suspended publication. Its_man- gers say, “There is no room in the United States at this time for a free magazine.” It is probable that there never will be room in the United States for the kind of free magazine that the managers of The Masses have had in mind to n It has been by intention and accomplishment a shock-publication. When it printed the verses representing the mother of Christ as a woman who had been seduced, it illustrated its appalling defect in sense. The verses were outrageous blasphemy to some people and an insult to the sense of decency of almost everyone who has any such sense. They achieved for the paper exclusion from the Subway news-stands and sent the editor wailing to his public about infringement of the right of free speech. But the crime against free speech was committed by the editor of The Masses when he got his paper excluded by an indefensible and intolerable publi cation, The paper had good in it and plenty of talent, but it stood for nothing but destruction, and had not discretion enough to stand to good purpose for that. What its per- suasions lead to is being disclosed by the Bolsheviki in Kussia. What can be done by explosives to improve the world is being adequately performed in Europe and else- where. The assistance of The Masses in that line is not needed. * PA, why are they always digging up New York?” YE PLEASE GO KIND 0’ FASY OVER OUR MUD-PIES, Because there's money ii ?