Life, 1920-11-18 · page 8 of 44
Life — November 18, 1920 — page 8: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
The main cartoon titled "AFTER THE READING" depicts a well-dressed man reading aloud to a reclining gentleman while a dog sleeps nearby. The caption satirizes pretentious cultural consumption: the reader claims he's "worked on this play nearly two years and want your candid opinion," to which the listener replies dismissively, "All work and no play, old dear." The accompanying article "Royal Pedagogues" mocks American parents who hire foreign tutors hoping their children will adopt European refinement and manners, rather than developing "selfishness and egoism." The humor lies in critiquing aspirational middle-class parenting and cultural snobbery. The bottom cartoon shows a domestic dispute about divorce, with dialogue emphasizing that arguments with wives prove pointless—a commentary on marital conflict and gender relations of the period.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
i. i | een) Willi AFTER THE READING “QVE WORKED ON THIS PLAY NEARLY TWO YEARS AND WANT YOUR CANDID OPINION,” p “ALL WORK AND NO PLAY, OLD DEAR.” The Old, Old Story HE fall of a baseball player is thus described by young Felsch: “I got into the deal when I found out that the others were in it, anyhow—I'd have been five thousand dollars out if I'd stayed out. Not that that’s any excuse. . . . The whole deal seemed so easy when we fell for it—we were expert ballplayers, and it would have been a snap for us to get away with it, they said. We fell.” Adam, as we recollect, had a similar experience, only in his case it was a woman. In this present baseball case it was “money. But, after all, upon whom do we spend most of our money? S° live that your friends can conscientiously defend you— but never have to. LIFE’S Fresh Air Fund HE following statement shows the operations of the fund for the sum- mer of 1920: RECEIPTS Balance forward from 1919..$ $23.47 Contributions ++ 16,687.63 Interest from Marion Story Fund ss 210.00 Interest. from’ Endowments and Reserve ....... 1,971.83 DISBURSEMENTS Help ...... Transportation Food and Supplies Repairs Postage, Insurance Miscellaneous Reserve Fund Balance Forward to 1921. ....+++++ Season opened June 2sth, Season closed Sep- tember 3rd. Children entertained, 703. Aver- age cost per child, $11.53. Royal Pedagogues T is to be hoped that kindly yet mis- guided parents will not yield to the temptation of providing Johnny and Mary with an archduke for a tutor or a princess for a governess. Left to their own devices, American children can bring themselves up quite as badly as could possibly be imagined. Why bother them with foreign examples of selfishness and egotism, inconsiderateness and intemper- ance, insolence and impudence? American children are quite able to become ar- rogant and useless, a terror and a warn- ing to the dinner guests, all by themselves. And there is always the underlying dan- ger that the American child might imbibe some of the latest, atavistic virtues that royalty must once have had to make it royal. Which would be truly horrible for a one-hundred-per-cent. American child that was truly one-hundred-per-cent. American child. H.W. H. Jack: ARE YOU CONTESTING HER SUIT FOR DIVORCE? Tom: WHAT’s THE USE? 1 NEVER WON AN ARGUMENT WITH THAT WOMAN IN MY LIFE. comicbooks.¢omy\