Ezra's Bookshelf

Janet Flanner’s World

by Janet Flanner · 388 pages · ~7 hrs

HistoryMedia & Journalism

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Janet Flanner reported on Europe for The New Yorker from 1925 until 1975, covering everything from Parisian culture to the rise of fascism to postwar reconstruction. This collection focuses on her writing from Germany and occupied Europe before and during World War II, and from Italy in the years that followed. Flanner wrote under the byline 'Genet' and was known for her stylish, observant prose. She had the advantage of being an American abroad, able to see European politics without European baggage. Her dispatches from Germany in the 1930s captured the atmosphere of a society sliding toward catastrophe; her postwar reports documented the rubble and rebuilding. Flanner knew the famous—from Hemingway to de Beauvoir—but wrote as often about ordinary people and quotidian observation. Her work bridges journalism and literature, reporting that also constitutes a distinctive literary voice. For readers interested in mid-century Europe through American eyes, this collection offers incomparable witness.

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