Life — January 8, 1920 — page 5: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

# Analysis This page contains no political cartoon or satire. The left column features a serious poem titled "Apostasy" by Berton Braley, critiquing intellectual pretension and superficiality among the upper classes—themes common to 1920s social commentary. The right side is entirely a **Pepsodent toothpaste advertisement**. The ad promotes a new film-dissolving dentifrice, claiming it removes the "slimy film" that causes tooth decay and discoloration. It emphasizes scientific validation ("approved by high dental authorities") and offers a free 10-day sample tube. This represents typical early 20th-century advertising rhetoric: marketing a product through pseudo-scientific claims and appeals to expert authority—methods now recognized as common in vintage advertising but relatively novel then.