The Wasp — 1921 — page 35: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This is a dramatic dialogue scene between two characters: **Mel** (likely "Mademoiselle," suggested by the General's address) and **General Gretcheff**. The General reveals he fathered a child with the artist **Catherine Anna Melipoff**, a woman publicly known as the anarchist revolutionary **Irma Korevna**. He hoped this confession would move Mel emotionally. Mel coldly rejects him, declaring the "primal instinct" to protect life means nothing—she has no filial connection to him. She accuses him of wronging a woman through "insolence of power." The satire appears to target either General Gretcheff's hypocrisy (claiming moral instinct while abusing power) or possibly critiques romantic/patriarchal assumptions about women. The political context involving anarchism and government authorities suggests broader social commentary, though specific historical details remain unclear.