Life, 1920-12-09 · page 18 of 44
Life — December 9, 1920 — page 18: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page from *Life* magazine presents multiple satirical pieces mocking American social conventions and pretension. **"Literary Challenge"** ridicules affected sophistication—offering a deliberately pompous non-answer about English novelists that says nothing while sounding erudite, satirizing how people use empty verbosity to appear cultured. **"Bobbie" joke** mocks committees as bureaucratic inefficiency—a straightforward jab at institutional waste. **"Local Gossip"** presents rural dialect humor about a farmer (Sim Ford) whose pig pen catches fire. The satire targets rural simplicity; the parson's comment about "beacon" vs. "bacon" plays on the absurdity of the situation, while the pig surviving represents dark, crude humor. **"Stage-Struck"** uses theatrical metaphor to critique Fate as a cruel puppet-master exploiting performers. **"Social Worker"** satirizes the disconnect between progressive social policy and economic reality—a social worker's advice about seven-year utility conflicts with a Georgia woman's matter-of-fact acceptance that her children work in factories at that age, exposing child labor's persistence despite reform efforts.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
1094 LIFE’S Ready Replies Use Them and Be Assured Against Embarrassment; They Never Fail Tue Literary CHALLENGE UESTION: Don't you just love the younger English novelists? Answer: From certain comprehensible points of view your implied enthusiasm is quite justified. It has, I might say, my ratification; with, of course, reservations. To tell the truth, I find among them a great deal of satisfactory realism which is highly desirable in stories having a romantic flavor; but some- times I am tempted to think that the philosophy of the writers is too pessimistic even for cheerful books. Our novelists have much to learn from the English; only less, indeed, than the English have to learn of ours. I like the country-life and city- life stories best, for in them one finds the widest sweep of the imagination governing situations calling for the most scrupulous devotion to fact. OBBIE: What is a committee, pa? Fatuer: A committec, my son, is something which takes a weck to do what one good man can do in an hour. Moving-Picture Director on Location: WHAT A PEACH OF A PLACE FOR A COMEDY! LOCAL GOSSIP Sim Ford wuz cleanin’ up his yard, rakin’ up leaves an’ sech an’ burnin’ uv ‘em, an’ afore he nutticed, his hog pen hed ketched an’ wuz afire all over, so’st thar wan't no chanct 0” savin’ it, and Sim's pig wuz inside; but thar wan't nothin’ he could do about it, The parson come past and ast Sim, “ What, brother,” sez he, “is the beacon?” “'Tain't so much beacon as it is bacon,” sez Sim. “I wuz cleanin’ up the yard.” The parson ‘lowed ef he kep’ on the place would be tolerable clean. Then Maria Ford seen the pigsty goin’, and she come a-runnin’ “What shell I do? What shell I do?” sez she. “Wall,” sez Sim, “ yeou better bring the parson a knife an’ fork. 'Twa'n't so bad tho’. The pig come out himself when it gut too hot fer him, and Maria tol’ Sim she wuz glad thar wuz some brains on the place, anyhow. Stage-Struck H, Fate, you are an organ grinder, hard and mean, And I your monkey, grimacing with rage Because I know, before my finest trick they’ve seen, You'll jerk me, squealing, off this tinseled stage. OCIAL WORKER: If you keep a thing seven years you will be able to make it useful. Mrs. Georcta Fiorina: Yes; my children all start factory- work at that age. The Headless Horseman of Sleepy Hollow: wHat CHANCE HAS A DECENT, SELF-RESPECTING APPARITION COT THESE DAYS, 1'D LIKE TO KNOW? comicbooks.com