Life, 1926-04-01 · page 29 of 46
Life — April 1, 1926 — page 29: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page reviews two books and includes a cartoon satirizing wealthy Protestant hypocrisy. **The Reviews:** The text critiques Kathleen Norris's *The Black Flemings* as a convoluted melodrama with implausible plot twists, and praises F. Scott Fitzgerald's *All the Sad Young Men* as showing improvement in his characterization of wealthy, alcoholic youth. **The Cartoon:** The illustration depicts a well-dressed woman (labeled "Devout Lady") speaking to a doctor after church services. She expresses sadness about the old church being demolished—but then reveals the real point: she's pleased because her congregation is relocating to Park Avenue (an elite Manhattan address), and she believes God will prefer the more fashionable location. **The Satire:** The joke mocks the materialism of wealthy Protestants who equate spiritual devotion with social status and wealth. The woman's casual assumption that God shares her class-consciousness—that He'd prefer a church on prestigious Park Avenue over a historic neighborhood building—exposes how thoroughly consumerism and status-seeking have replaced genuine religious values.
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¥ $ Kathleen Norris (Doubleday, Page), is the most tangled web yet woven from the Cinderella theme. The author herself is obliged to burn “Ts BLACK FLEMINGS,” by the house down to put an end to its ramifications, so far be it from a mere reviewer to attempt their explanation beyond the hint that there is consider- able uncertainty throughout the book as to who, amongst the legatee residents of Wastewater Hall, is related to whom, and how. On one page, the withered old woman who has been hidden away for years in a secluded wing is Ge clle’s mother, and on the next she is nothing but her aunt. In spite of this blustering attempt at mystery, a child of ten knows from the night of the house party that the lovely Gay is really the child of Roger Fle and that she will have the dashing David for her own in the end, even though theiy court- it ri ship is conducted with the persp: and dialogue which might be expect from two of the nobler and better mates of a sclect home for the feeble- minded. But since it develops that Gay's mother was the Marie-Odile type—she thought that babies grew on trees and had one of her own without any con- sciousness or memory of the expe —perhaps we mustn't expect too much of her daughter, The reader is hereby warned that he is also expected to swal- low a scene wherein a villainous old woman who has changed babies in their 1 secluded a half-wit nd attempted to rob the righteous of their inheritance, says, “I meant no harm!" and gets away with it. Nothing like the steam-roller when it comes to smoot! cradle, deceived a sister for years things out for the Great American Public V HEN a friend of mine once told me that her younger ma ter was becoming awfully Scott-Fitz- geraldy, I asked for more ment and received, “Oh, she hi tied sis- levee every morning attended by th type of young man who doesn’t realize he's had a thing to drink until he falls down on the floor.” “All the Sad Young Men” (Scribner) is the title of Mr. Fitzgerald's latest ¢ and as e who has never seen much merit in his writin Great ( performance, I herewith set down that nd who considered “The a bewildering and tawdry in these short stories he has © con- siderably forward from the days when rotagonists could be so Ti Th characterized electric flashes and the and the more ° We Brel Devout Lady (after the service): OF COURSE, DOCTOR, WE ALL FEEL SORRY TO SEF THE OLD CHURCH COME DOWN, BUT THEN, IT'S SUCH A COMFORT TO K ARE MOVING TO PARK AVENUE—AND FRANKLY, I THINK THE LORD WILL LIKE IT EVEN BETTER THERE, OW THAT WE comicbooks.com