Wednesday, October 3, 2012 - 5:00pm
In the years following World War I, the New Orleans French Quarter
attracted artists and writers with low rent, a faded charm, and colorful
street life. By the 1920s Jackson Square became the center of a vibrant
but short-lived bohemia. A young William Faulkner and his roommate
William Spratling, an artist who taught at Tulane, were among the
"artful and crafty ones of the French Quarter," In Dixie Bohemia John
Shelton Reed introduces Faulkner's circle of friends ranging from the
distinguished Sherwood Anderson to a gender-bending Mardi Gras costume
designer and brings to life the people and places of New Orleans in the
jazz age. Reed begins with Faulkner and Spratling's self-published
homage to their fellow bohemians, Sherwood Anderson and Other Famous
Creoles. The book was comprised of 43 sketches of New Orleans artists,
by Spratling, with captions and a short introduction by Faulkner. The
title was a rather obscure joke, Sherwood was not a Creole and neither
were most of the people featured. But with Reed's commentary, these
profiles serve as an entry into the world of litterateurs and dramatists
that dined on Decatur Street, attended masked balls, and blatantly
ignored the Prohibition Act. These individuals also helped establish New
Orleans institutions like the Double Dealer literary magazine, the Arts
& Crafts Club, and Le Petit Theatre. But unlike most bohemias, Reed
explains, the one in New Orleans was predominately white and rigidly
segregated. Though many of them were relatively progressive, and often
employed African-American material in their own work, Reed notes that
few of them knew or cared about what was going on across town among the
city s black intellectuals and artists. The positive developments from
this renaissance, however, attracted attention and visitors, inspiring
the historic preservation and commercial revitalization that turned the
area from a slum into a tourist destination. Predictably, this
gentrification drove out many of the working artists and writers who
helped revived the area. As Reed points out one resident who had
identified herself as an artist on the 1920 federal census gave her
occupation in 1930 as "saleslady, real estate," reflecting eventual
decline of a once blossoming artistic class. A charming and insightful
glimpse into an era, Dixie Bohemia describes the writers, artists,
poseurs, and hangers-on of the New Orleans art scene in the 1920s and
illuminates how this dazzling world faded as quickly as it began.
Event address:
160 Courthouse Sq
38655-3914 Oxford
usBooks:
$38.00
Email or call for price.
Email or call for price.
ISBN: 9780807147641
Published: LSU Press - September 17th, 2012