Life, 1925-12-10 · page 31 of 36
Life — December 10, 1925 — page 31: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
The left column contains a poem satirizing theatrical critics' struggle to find fresh adjectives. The poet (T.B.) catalogs worn-out praise words—"brilliant," "splendid," "excellent"—showing how critical vocabulary has been exhausted by overuse. The humor peaks when the critic, under deadline pressure ("I'll lose my job if they catch me behind"), abandons eloquence entirely and simply writes that a show called "Zip! Zip!" is "punk." This mocks both the pretensions of professional critics and the impossibility of finding original language in a glutted marketplace. The "Life and Letters" section below reviews recent books, including John Erskine's *The Private Life of Helen of Troy*, which reimagines classical figures as ordinary people with domestic concerns—a popular literary trend of the era that "humanizes" historical icons. The right side contains shipping advertisements for transatlantic ocean liners, standard magazine filler of the period.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Quandary of an Adjectival Critic “BRILLIANT” is sour, and “splendid” is trite; “Shining” is Woollcott’s, and “adequate” Broun's; ittering” doesn’t express the thing right; i is a word for back-country buffoons. Lustrous"? “Effulgent”? They don’t seem to fit; “Marvelous”? That's just a trifle de trop; “Na “Resplendent”? They're off quite a bit; “Good” is a stock word that never could go. “Excellent” sounds rather—what shall we say? Sparkling” is fair, but not just in the vein; “Exquisite”? “Worthy”? “Select"? Nay, nay, nay! Gorgeous” is something that gives me a pain. “Grand” smacks of flapper. (Come, boy, rack that bean.) “Stately”? “Majestic”? “Exalted”? “Sublime”? “Model” ?—oh, no, that connotes it's too clean, (Never be able to get one in time.) “Precious”? “Rare”? “Subtle”? (I'm losing my mind.) “Choice”? (That edition must get on the press; I'll lose my job if they catch me behind; Only got five minutes more—maybe less.) Bother the adjectives! We'll let her rip, Kill fancy writing and cut out the bunk: “Last night your critic attended ‘Zip! Zip!’ Finds no words for it—except that it’s punk.” T. B. Life and Letters (Continued from page 21) stardom as hussies is threatened, and I, for one, am not so much in sympathy with the movement to whitewash them is I might be. The last two books about Cleopatra's life and times did not exactly make her out a home-body, but they indicated strongly that her interests were maternal and as monogamous as circumstances would permit, and that she was by no means as red as she had been painted. And now along comes John Erskine with “The Private Life of Helen of Troy” (Bobbs- Merrill), which makes its heroine vut to have been a good wife and mother, and Menelaus omething of a boob. Even though it makes excellent read- . [don't know whether or not I like it. Fiction it is, of course, but there is a slight disturbance in the arousal of a suspicion that Helen may have talked sense all the time and kept an eye on the cook. It is nevertheless joyous to get what academicians would probably call the low-down on these ancient Greeks. The intimate, informal dialogue makes them seem more human, and much nearer to us than to the gods, Mrs, Dodge in “Women” didn’t have a harder time with her Lily than Helen had with her Hermione. Many a good woman and true has sat in the fashionable restaurants of the world’s leading pleasure resorts and won- dered how the ladies with diamond bracelets half-way up both arms and a lot of gold vanity things beside the bread and butter plate manage to make their hauls. Well, “Gentlemen Prefer Blond by Anita Loos (Boni & Liveright), is the intimate diary of one super-gold-digger, and gives a fair idea as to the ways and means of her pro- fession. It will also give you more laughs to the page than any book you've read since the adolescent days when screaming over your favorite humorist was a matter of course, I like best the entry about the party to which sev- eral famous “literary gentlemen” came to help Lorelei, Gloria and Dorothy improve their minds, “so of course the place was a wreck this morning and Lulu and I worked like proverbial dogs to get it cleaned up, but Heaven knows how long it will take to get the chandelier fixed.” Baird Leonard. To ENGLAND FRANCE IRELAND GERMANY Sptenpiw service, unexcelled cuisine, spacious and luxurious accommodations are salient features on the de luxe steamers: RESOLUTE DEUTSCHLAND RELIANCE ALBERT BALLIN HAMBURG (e~) and the one class cabin steamers: CLEVELAND ‘WESTPHALIA THURINGIA UNITED AMERICAN LINES (HARRIMAN LINE) Joint Service with HAMBURG-AMERICAN LINE 35-39 Broadway, N.Y. 177.N. Michigan Ave., Chicago 131 State St., Boston, 230 South 15th St., Philadelphi 574 Market St.,San Francisco or local steamship and tourist Irate Mr. Beetle: wow! WERE 1 WENT AND INVITED THAT CATERPILLAR TO OUR GREAT CHRISTMAS-TREE PARTY, AND NOW LOOK aT IT! comicbooks.com