Lost Girls: The Invention of the Flapper

2017 | Gender Studies

In the glorious, boozy party after the First World War, 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 this book argues, she didn't appear out of nowhere. This spirited history presents a fresh look at the reality of young women's experiences in America and Britain from the 1890s to the 1920s, when the 'modern' girl emerged. Lost Girls is a story of youth derided and fetishized; of ageing viscerally feared. It is a story of a culture beset by anxiety about adolescent girls. And it is a story of young women trying to shape their own identity amidst contradictory theories of adolescence and sexuality, the politics of suffrage, and the popular fiction, theatre, cinema and dance hall crazes of the time. Linda Simon shows us how the modern girl bravely created a culture, a look and a future of her own. Lost Girls is an illuminating history of the iconic flapper as she evolved from a problem to a temptation, and finally, in the 1920s and beyond, to an aspiration.

Linda Simon (Author)