About this item
In the glorious, boozy party that followed World War I, a new being burst defiantly onto the world stage: the flapper. Young, impetuous, and flirtatious, she was an alluring, controversial figure, celebrated in movies, fiction, plays, and the pages of fashion magazines. But, as Linda Simon argues, the flapper didn't appear out of nowhere. Lost Girls gives us a spirited history with a fresh look at the reality of young women's experiences in America and Britain from the 1890s to the 1920s - the era when the "modern girl" emerged. Lost Girls is a story of youth derided and fetishized; of aging viscerally feared. It is a story of young women growing up in a culture beset by anxiety about adolescent girls. It is about women trying to shape their own identity amid contradictory theories of adolescence and sexuality, the politics of suffrage, and popular fiction, theater, cinema, and dance hall crazes.
About the Author
Linda Simon's books include biographies of Alice B. Toklas (Gertrude Stein's companion and famous cookbook author) , Thornton Wilder (playwright who wrote Our Town) , William James (founder of American psychology) , Margaret Beaufort (grandmother of Henry VIII) , and Coco Chanel. What do these men and women have in common? Defiance. Each of them fought against the life that they should have led to create their own bold path. That's why they made such fascinating subjects. In her biographies, Simon illuminates the struggles, challenges, self-doubts, and moments of pure luck that shaped their lives. She's now working on a history of the circus. After all, isn't running away to join the circus one way to defy the life other people have planned out for you?
