Salmagundi was a newspaper created by Washington Irving in the beginning of the nineteenth century that tried to produce a literary magazine that would separate itself from other journalistic writing. This was the first newspaper of its kind, where the authors intentionally tried to depart from journalistic practices. Within its first couple of issues, the periodical established itself as a bold, satirical, and coy newspaper whose purpose was to please the writers, not the readers. For Salmagundi, political writing was not as important as satirical culture pieces and poetic pieces. However, the newspaper would still comment on the political atmosphere in crafty ways. Irving created the character Mustapha Rub-a-Dub Keli Khan to comment on the
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Mustapha argues language, as a weapon, does not produce results and defends this claim by criticizing Congress for being “all talk and no cider” and by criticizing the President for only deploying words in the face of any event (148). The author censures Congress for having “chattered through a whole session” and in return having nothing but “the length of their tongues and the emptiness of their heads,” to show for all their work (148). The author ridicules Congress’s failure by critiquing them with a sentence that is abnormally long and composed of almost a hundred words. Mustapha utilizes a verbose sentence to present to the reader that he and Congress could have achieved their goals in a more concise and efficient manner. Mustapha then scrutinizes the President because whether an invader is attacking their shores, or a citizen is detained on a foreign war ship, the President’s reaction is to “utter a speech,” rather than actively trying to fix the problem (149). In this section of the article, the author again creates a paradox, because he is mirroring the prose of a speech while chastising the President for always making speeches. In numerous speeches, an orator will utilize repetition to emphasize their main points. By repeating the phrase “utters a speech” five times in five sentences, Mustapha emphasizes the lack of action from the President
Mustapha argues language, as a weapon, does not produce results and defends this claim by criticizing Congress for being “all talk and no cider” and by criticizing the President for only deploying words in the face of any event (148). The author censures Congress for having “chattered through a whole session” and in return having nothing but “the length of their tongues and the emptiness of their heads,” to show for all their work (148). The author ridicules Congress’s failure by critiquing them with a sentence that is abnormally long and composed of almost a hundred words. Mustapha utilizes a verbose sentence to present to the reader that he and Congress could have achieved their goals in a more concise and efficient manner. Mustapha then scrutinizes the President because whether an invader is attacking their shores, or a citizen is detained on a foreign war ship, the President’s reaction is to “utter a speech,” rather than actively trying to fix the problem (149). In this section of the article, the author again creates a paradox, because he is mirroring the prose of a speech while chastising the President for always making speeches. In numerous speeches, an orator will utilize repetition to emphasize their main points. By repeating the phrase “utters a speech” five times in five sentences, Mustapha emphasizes the lack of action from the President