E X T E N S I O N THE DARK SIDE OF THE TWENTIES: YOU ARE ALL A LOST GENERATION The Lost Generation was a group of American writers who became the symbol of an era in the 1920s. It was Gertrude Stein who rst addressed them by saying, You are all a lost generation . She referred to the fact that the young American intellectuals who had fought in the First World Ernest Hemingway War felt lost , disillusioned1, and alienated2 from their mother country. They had experienced the horrors and fear of the war in Europe and now they saw the contradictions of the contemporary American society, in which the middle classes were enjoying a period of great prosperity, while the lower classes faced unemployment and poverty. That is why, in their books, they described American society as hypocritical3 and materialistic4. They wanted to break with tradition, and, to do so, they explored new themes and new techniques. The most important authors of this group are Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, Francis Scott Fitzgerald, and John Steinbeck. Main Themes Disillusionment: After World War I, people did not believe in traditional values such as honor, courage, and patriotism5 anymore.The main characters in these books felt alienated and without a purpose in life. Even though they looked for meaning in a post-war world, they often failed to nd an answer. Jake Barnes from The Sun Also Rises (1926) by Hemingway and Nick Carraway from The Great Gatsby (1925) by 1. disillusioned: disappointed because the person you admired or the idea you believed to be good and true now seems without value. The noun is disillusionment. 2. alienated: the feeling that you do not belong to a particular group. 3. hypocritical: behaving in a way that does not meet the moral standards or match the opinions that you have. 4. materialistic: caring more about money and possessions than anything else. 5. patriotism: love of your country and desire to defend it. 70