Bohemians: The Glamorous Outcasts
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Book Overview
Since the early nineteenth century, the bohemian has been the protagonist of the story the West has wanted to hear about its artists-a story of genius, glamour, and doom. The bohemian takes on many guises: the artist dying in poverty like Modigliani or an outrageous entertainer like Josephine Baker. Elizabeth Wilson's enjoyable book is a quest for the many shifting meanings that constitute the bohemian and bohemia. She tells unforgettable stories of the artists, intellectuals, radicals, and hangers-on who populated the salons, bars, and cafs of Paris, London, New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco, including Djuna Barnes, Juliette Greco, Allen Ginsberg, William Burroughs, Jack Kerouac, Amiri Baraka, Andy Warhol, and Jackson Pollock. Bohemians also follows the women who contributed to the myth, including the wives and mistresses, the muses, lesbians, and independent artists. Wilson explores the bohemians' eccentric use of dress, the role of sex and erotic love, the bohemian search for excess, and the intransigent politics of many. As a new millennium begins, Wilson shows how notions of bohemianism remain at the core of heated cultural debates about the role of art and artists in an increasingly commodified and technological world.
Format:Hardcover
Language:English
ISBN:0813528941
ISBN13:9780813528946
Release Date:November 2000
Publisher:Rutgers University Press
Length:275 Pages
Weight:1.30 lbs.
Dimensions:1.0" x 6.4" x 9.5"
Related Subjects
Art Arts, Music & Photography Cultural Politics & Social Sciences Pop Culture Social SciencesCustomer Reviews
1 rating
not such a bad book.
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 15 years ago
i actually really like this book & i am not an intellectual featherweight. i agree to an extent w/ the above- or belownoted comments; there are probably wavery facts herein. i wish there werent. unfortunately, that is something i see continually in non-fiction books, particularly bothersome when the reader [such as the other reviewer or myself] actually knows the obscure facts. i would say this problem is an artefact of the postpostmodern age, but i am certain it predates it. having seen so many supposed historical accounts resplendent w/ the same issues, i can only wonder how much we really know about anything that predates or is distant from our own situational awareness. this book is, however, an excellent overview of a subject which should have but strangely has not been accorded too much book length scrutiny. since the bohemian contingent of postpostmodern life has been co-opted into the macrocosm & , in commitment, reduced to the nanocosm, perhaps people who pick this up will be more inspired & enlightened. @this point, there is not that much better in this realm for which one can hope.
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