Readers of advertisements of a certain brand of cigarettes are
diverted, or are meant to be, by aphorisms allegedly Oriental and epigrammatic in form and prefaced by the mendacious affirmation, " Confucius say." Now I see a London daily paper is borrowing the idea, which has had an interesting history. Its originator was Walter Winchell, the well-known American columnist, who began adorning his column with Confucianisms (e.g., " Confucius say ' girl with future should beware of man with past' ") towards th.-. end of 1938. It caught on surprisingly. Collections of Confucianisms were sold on the New York streets, a " Con- fucius say " song was warbled and whistled through t'-e forty-eight States of the Union, a " Confucius say " dress was worn by a mannequin at the Sport and Work Apparel Show in Chicago. And Mr. Winchell's enterprising Press agent hired a couple of Chinese, infuriated at the insult to their national sage (actually waiters in a Chinese restaurant), to arm themselves with dagger and chopper and chase the columnist across Miami Beach—with a photographer, of course, in the offing. Now Mr. Winchell has got tired of Confucianisms and given them up. But they are still, it appears, good currency this side.
Previous page
