THE LOST
GENERATION
The members of the Lost Generation were
born at the turn of the 20th century, when the
world was changing at a rapid pace. The
automobile was making its mark on society,
becoming a popular mode of transportation.
The Wright Brothers took the first airplane
flight. Sigmund Freud released his
groundbreaking work, "The Interpretation of
Dreams."
As this generation was coming of age, millions
of immigrants poured into the United States,
searching for a better life. With the
competition for jobs and ever-increasing class
distinction, the members of the Lost
Generation became independent and self-
sufficient, not looking to their elders for
guidance.
World War I had a tremendous influence on this
generation. It lasted many years, and by the time it
had ended, millions of men had been affected by the
horrors of battle, losing a sense of the values their
parents had instilled in them.
War had forced this generation to grow up quickly, and
for those who'd spent years in the trenches, war was
all that they really knew. After the soldiers returned
home, governments started ignoring their heroes,
which caused the veterans to become quickly
disillusioned with government.
In fact, this generation became skeptical of all authority,
especially now that their parents were pushing for
Prohibition. After the war, the Lost Generation started
exploring its own set of values, ones that clearly went
against what their elders had already established.
Through its rebellion, the Lost Generation came up with
its own social mores that gave rise to the Roaring '20s,
with its gangsters, speakeasies and hedonism.
This self-indulgent spree came crashing to a halt when
the stock market crashed in 1929, leaving this
generation to navigate the Great Depression during
what would be the high point of their careers.
Members of the Lost Generation were also
nomadic. Many who had been to war no longer
felt the need to return home, instead flocking
to cities and even to Europe. Paris became
one of the biggest outposts for expatriates,
and it became a center for literary
achievement of the day.
Famous Lost
Generation
Writers
While the phrase "Lost Generation" classifies a
generation of youth, it has a special
connotation in the literary world. Many
Americans who'd experienced Europe during
the Great War returned overseas as a way to
escape mainstream America. A community of
expatriates formed in Paris, and in looking at
America from a distance, these writers created
a new literary culture that captured the futile
spirit of the times.
Ernest Hemingway, who helped popularize the
term "Lost Generation" in his novel "The Sun
Also Rises," was one of the leaders of this
group of expatriates who fled to Paris. Much
like he and his contemporaries, Hemingway's
protagonists tended to be honest men who
lost hope and faith in modern society.
F. Scott Fitzgerald's work also delves into this
feeling of futility. His 1920 debut novel "This
Side of Paradise" captures a mood of a
generation that has fought wars and no longer
believes in God or man. Fitzgerald's later
works also capture the hedonistic spirit of the
Jazz Age with "The Great Gatsby," an
exploration of the moralities of the wealthy,
being a seminal work of this time.
Poet E. E. Cummings served as an ambulance
driver in France during the war but was
captured and imprisoned by the French, who
thought he was a spy. After the war, he
embodied the persona of the Lost Generation
writer, living in both Greenwich Village and
rural Connecticut, with frequent trips to Paris.
His poetry pushes the boundaries of form, and
by playing with spelling and syntax, he
created new techniques and structures for his
work.
Among the Lost Generation writers, John Dos Passos
stands out as a novelist who really attempted to
assimilate European culture. American by birth, Dos
Passos spent his formative years in Europe, returning
to America for college before spending time in Spain.
He eventually volunteered for the war effort, which
influenced his work "Three Soldiers," the first major
anti-war novel of this period. However, as time
passed, Dos Passos became more conservative in his
political views and was estranged from his
contemporaries, who were very much disillusioned
with the current ideology.
