Rediscovering the Lost Generation of Literature
By Katie Le Saint
LIFESTYLE
Edited by Cece Wilson
7/5/20262 min read
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The 1920s were a time of change, recovery, and discovery following the First World War. When we think of the decade, it is easy to imagine only the Roaring Twenties – a period of freedom and prosperity often portrayed in modern media. Yet this is not the whole story. Life in a post-war world demanded adjustment, and many struggled to reconnect with American society. Trust in traditional values and beliefs in morality and order had been shattered, and rebuilding them would take time, resulting in widespread disillusionment and resentment towards expected social norms.
The term Lost Generation describes a group of writers who came of age before or during the First World War and experienced profound disillusionment with their home country. Many relocated to Paris or other European cities, drawn to artistic communities where they could live and write. The phrase was coined by Gertrude Stein and later used in the epigraph of Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises. Stein reportedly told Hemingway, “You are all a lost generation,” referring to writers associated with this movement, including F. Scott Fitzgerald, T. S. Eliot, and Ernest Hemingway.
Lost Generation literature often features protagonists disconnected from both society and themselves. Parties and alcohol recur as symbols of attempts to numb or escape inner emptiness. Fitzgerald's Jay Gatsby exemplifies this: his lavish displays of wealth are efforts to belong and prove his worth. Gatsby mirrors the generation's attempt to fill the emotional void left by the war through excess. The Great Gatsby is widely studied and, thanks to Baz Luhrmann's 2013 film adaptation, well known; yet its historical context is often overlooked in favor of Gatsby's glamour. This fuels a debate between substance and surface, with many reading it merely as a Jazz Age tale rather than an exploration of the fractured American Dream.
“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”
Like Fitzgerald, Hemingway was a defining voice of 1920s literature. The Sun Also Rises follows a group of expatriates in post-war Paris seeking meaning, focusing on Jake Barnes and Lady Brett Ashley as they travel from Paris to Spain. Published in 1926, it is often read as a portrait of the Lost Generation, with clear parallels to Hemingway's own war experiences as a wounded ambulance driver. His protagonists bear deep psychological scars beneath a stoic exterior, earning the label “Code Heroes” and reflecting a post-war moral dislocation shaped by exposure to conflict.
Paris formed the backdrop to these works and the home of many of their writers. Shakespeare and Company, arguably the most famous bookshop in the world, was more than a bookshop: it was a creative hub and meeting place that supported young authors and fostered a community for those who felt alienated from mainstream society.
The Lost Generation captures a cultural shift and a sense of disconnection from authority that still resonates a century later. Through their literature, its writers left enduring works that continue to speak to modern readers.
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