The Brass Check: A Study of American JournalismSinclair, Upton
General
The Brass Check: A Study of American Journalism
Sinclair, Upton
Associated Press; Journalism -- United States; Press -- United States
Not merely have the money-masters stamped their sign upon the contents
of the magazines, they have changed the very form to suit their
purposes. Time was when you could take the vast bulk of a magazine, and
rip off one fourth from the front and two fourths from the back, and in
the remaining fourth you had something to read in a form you could
enjoy. But the advertising gentry got on to that practice and stopped
it. They demanded what they call “full position,” next to
reading-matter. One magazine gave way, and then another; until now all
popular magazines are cunning traps to bring your mind into subjection
to the hawkers of wares. I pick up the current number of the “Literary
Digest”; there are a hundred and twenty-eight pages, and the advertising
begins on page thirty-five. I pick up the current number of the
“Saturday Evening Post”; there are a hundred and fifty-eight pages, and
the advertising begins on page twenty-nine. You start an article or a
story, and they give you one or two clean pages to lull your suspicions,
and then at the bottom you read, “Continued on page 93.” You turn to
page ninety-three, and biff—you are hit between the eyes by a powerful
gentleman wearing a collar, or swat—you are slapped on the cheek by a
lady in a union-suit. You stagger down this narrow column, as one who
runs the gauntlet of a band of Indians with clubs; and then you read,
“Continued on page 99.” You turn to page ninety-nine, and somebody
throws a handful of cigarettes into your face, or maybe a box of candy;
or maybe it is the crack of a revolver, or the honk of an
automobile-horn that greets you. The theme of the reading-matter may be
the importance of war-savings, but before you get to the end of the
article you have been tempted by every luxury from a diamond scarf-pin
to a private yacht, and have spent in imagination more money than you
will earn in the balance of your life-time.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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