Spring Break
Literature's lost and found
WWI sparked new generation of writing that turned its back on the standard.
By: Tracey Wallace
Issue date: 3/5/09 Section: Features
American complacency grew rapidly in the early 1900s. Such ideas as manifest destiny and "under God" lost popularity as a mass culture opened its eyes to the reality of WWI in which there seemed to be no apparent special protection for American soldiers by God or government. Young Americans lost that je ne sais quoi for life and many expatriated themselves from a country that no longer offered any hope.
The majority of those expatiates found themselves living a new Parisian bohemian life surrounded by American artists creating the next wave of American classics that would define the entire American movement by one phrase alone: The Lost Generation.
Literally and figuratively the phrase summed up an entire society whom of which had been shocked into carelessness by a brutal war where good deeds and honorable values couldn't save you from death.
Suddenly, the American dream that generations of people had held steadfastly to appeared selfish, ignorant and a blatant impossibility. Parisian life was less optimistic and therefore more mature. For so many lost American souls, Paris offered cheap wine, good company and a hiding place, so to speak, from the ransacking reality that just didn't sit well on the generations' cerebellum.
In the midst of this carelessness and alcoholism such writers as Gertrude Stein, Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald rose to the top of their profession each refusing to abide by typical Victorian writing techniques that to them represented the binding fantasy world of the American culture.
Modernism was encircling the globe, and seemingly quicker than the war only a few years ended had. A new stream of consciousness was born and each author took on his or her own translations of the term.
Common ground existed not solely in the new interior dialogues of characters but in a new writing technique as a whole.
Sentences were shorter and punctuation wasn't always thought of as necessary. The stream of consciousness that led audiences on a whirlwind ride of self-analyzation by main characters often ended with no real ending at all. The fairytale novels of the past were old news and the realistic ones of the contemporary took strong hold.
The majority of those expatiates found themselves living a new Parisian bohemian life surrounded by American artists creating the next wave of American classics that would define the entire American movement by one phrase alone: The Lost Generation.
Literally and figuratively the phrase summed up an entire society whom of which had been shocked into carelessness by a brutal war where good deeds and honorable values couldn't save you from death.
Suddenly, the American dream that generations of people had held steadfastly to appeared selfish, ignorant and a blatant impossibility. Parisian life was less optimistic and therefore more mature. For so many lost American souls, Paris offered cheap wine, good company and a hiding place, so to speak, from the ransacking reality that just didn't sit well on the generations' cerebellum.
In the midst of this carelessness and alcoholism such writers as Gertrude Stein, Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald rose to the top of their profession each refusing to abide by typical Victorian writing techniques that to them represented the binding fantasy world of the American culture.
Modernism was encircling the globe, and seemingly quicker than the war only a few years ended had. A new stream of consciousness was born and each author took on his or her own translations of the term.
Common ground existed not solely in the new interior dialogues of characters but in a new writing technique as a whole.
Sentences were shorter and punctuation wasn't always thought of as necessary. The stream of consciousness that led audiences on a whirlwind ride of self-analyzation by main characters often ended with no real ending at all. The fairytale novels of the past were old news and the realistic ones of the contemporary took strong hold.
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