Event—Adult Education

American Expats in Jazz-Age Paris

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In the Jazz Age, Americans were exhorted to “make it new!” How did writers of the Lost Generation live out this edict?

Ernest Hemingway observing artillery bursts during the Civil War in Spain. Call number: Midwest MS Butcher Series 6 Box 41 Folder 1714

Class Description

This introductory exploration of the “Lost Generation” will include works by Stein, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Barnes, Wright, and numerous others.

These writers were products of their era, a time when Americans lived by the edict “Make it new!” How did the artists of the Lost Generation, living abroad in Paris, forge new creative pathways? And how might we view their work differently within the broader context of the Jazz Age?

Each class session will be structured around a single author and reading selections. While the focus will be on literature, class will include musical, film, or art selections to augment.

Dawn Sardella-Ayres received her PhD from the University of Cambridge in 2016, and has published on Alcott, Montgomery, and Wilder. Her current critical work explores girls’ literature as a distinct genre, and she is LM Montgomery Institute’s 2023 Research Associate.

Materials List

Required:

  • Sherwood Anderson, Winesburg, Ohio. Penguin RandomHouse, 2002. ISBN: 9780375753138
  • F. Scott Fitzgerald, This Side of Paradise. Vintage, 2009. ISBN: 978-0307474513
  • Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises. Warbler Classics, 2022. ISBN: 978-1957240466

First Reading:

Please read:

    • Selections from Anderson’s Winesburg, Ohio
    • Poems by Millay, H.D., Parker, Stein, Monroe (Instructor Distributed)
    • Eliot, The Waste Land (Instructor Distributed)

    Cost and Registration

    This class is full, but you can still register for the waitlist on Learning Stream.

    Four sessions, $215 ($193.50 for Newberry members, seniors, and students). Learn about becoming a member.

    To register multiple people for this class, please go through the course calendar in Learning Stream, our registration platform. When you select the course and register, you’ll be prompted to add another registrant.

    Register for Waitlist

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