Life, 1919-05-29 · page 28 of 42
Life — May 29, 1919 — page 28: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains two distinct pieces of social satire: **"Hospitality" (left)**: A domestic narrative mocking the monotony and invisibility of housework. The narrator catalogs tedious tasks (sink scrubbing, bottle organizing) while major world events like the League of Nations crumble unnoticed—satirizing how women's domestic labor isolates them from public concerns. The darkly ironic ending shows even a newly hired maid represents the futility of the system. **"Too True" (right)**: A cartoon satirizing shell-shocked WWI veterans. A traumatized soldier (appearing to be from the recent war) resents celebratory crowds cheering his regiment, while a pessimistic comrade warns that this public adulation won't translate to employment—he'll be turned away when asking for work. The separate cartoon below shows domestic frustration (a stuck drawer), underscoring the contrast between public heroics and private disappointments awaiting returned soldiers. Both pieces critique post-WWI American society: women's erasure through domesticity and veterans' invisible struggles despite nominal patriotic honors.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
HOSPITALITY that is light and delicately brown, I don't wonder cooks grow fat. I am begmning to feel fatter. My soul feels fatter, 2. L gather up the odds and ends from the drain of the sink. 1 scrub the sink. 1 set the cup-towels prim upon the rack. I put the empty milk bottles on the back-porch for the milkman who comes clattering up the alley in the dawn. How tragic it is that civilization permits only milk- men to view the miracleof dawn! Think of the irony of watching the sun rise over the alleys. . . . T spread a newspaper on the stove. The headlines jump at me—and fall away—the League of Nations falls away !—because I remember the pan beneath the icebox must be emptied. Lo! itis finished. 1 look upon my work, and find it good The doorbell rings! There is something fascinating about answermg the doorbell Something mysterious, It may be a tramp, All tramps have poets’ eyes, some day I shall try to become friends with a tramp, There are things ] want to know that only tramps have learned. Or it may be the census taker, who puts down scrubbers-of-sinks and makers-ol- omelettes as women of no occupation. Or it may be a maid answering my “ad.” I have engaged her. She is coming in an hour. aid she is a very excellent maid. T look at my sink across widening gulfs. It was too good to last. Smith: Too True OUGHBOY (sade irritable by shell shock, par wth his regiment through a crowd of voeiferor cheering citizens): 1 wish dey'd shut up der noise! Pessimistic Douciinoy (marching at other's side) : you asks dem for a job. HOORAY! WE'VE BEEN TRY FOR MONTHS TO OPEN THAT DRAWER