Paula wrote, >It's interesting, and probably natural, so many of us have written of the >escape the sixties offered from the (40s and) fifties. From the Dark Ages is >right, Marty (but maybe the Dark Ages had more going for them). Yes, the fifties are usually written off as a conservative time, but "underground" it was a very fertile period: in jazz, in the arts (the abstract expressionists), writing (the beats) popular music (rock and a new interest in folk roots), TV sit comes and popular comedians. comic books (Mad Magazine). What all these arts had in common was new their encouragement of new ways of seeing, a new more open aesthetic, of stretching the imagination -- and a social consciousness that didn't beat you over the head. Also, African American culture was the major creative force and this too gave people a new way of looking at society. A lot of authors have touched on the creative ferment of the fifties, but a definitive account has not yet been written. Marty Jezer Marty Jezer . 22 Prospect Street . Brattleboro, VT 05301 Author: Stuttering: A Life Bound Up in Words (Basic Books) Abbie Hoffman: American Rebel (Rutgers University Press) The Dark Ages: Life in the USA, 1945-1960 (South End Press) Rachel Carson [American Women of Achievement Series] (Chelsea House) Check out my web page: http://www.sover.net/~mjez
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