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Rating: 
Summary: The Bohemian spirit
Review: Among the Bohemians is a fascinating and thorough excursion through the colorful streets, homes and cafes of bohemian England during the early 20th Century. Virginia Nicholson, who is related to both the painter Vanessa Bell (often mentioned in this book) and the writer Virginia Woolf, handles the subject in a rather scholarly manner, covering a range of topics chapter by chapter. This organized approach may seem out of tune with the book's subject, but it works well here, allowing the reader to meet the same cast of characters from different vantage points. Like a naturalist studying the behavior of animals in the wild, Nicholson examines almost every conceivable aspect of bohemian life. Using memoirs from that era, we learn all about the homes, love lives, dress, eating habits, parties and child-rearing practices of these flamboyant characters.
Some writers (e.g. Herbert Gold) have successfully examined Bohemia from the inside, using a poetic and meandering voice, but Nicholson prefers the more sociological/ anthropological method. The fact that she is writing about a past era also makes a certain distance inevitable. Despite this methodical approach, Nicholson is not detached from her subject in a coldly objective way. She is clearly sympathetic and admiring of the people she describes. Indeed, she credits bohemians with creating much of the freedom we take for granted today. As she states in the introduction, Nicholson does not confine her study to famous people, though the well known (e.g. Dylan Thomas, Carrington, Robert Graves), are certainly not neglected. As an American, I had always associated Bohemia with places like Paris (which, Nicholson confirms, has always been the Bohemian capital), Greenwich Village and North Beach, but never England. This book filled in some rather large gaps in my knowledge, illustrating the very significant role played by bohemian Brits.
Nicholson has a genuine appreciation for the bohemian spirit, and acknowledges the sacrifices made by many obscure artists, poets and others existing (often marginally) at society's fringes. For some, the idealistic decision to forsake conventional society for a life dedicated to art, romance, poetry or perhaps a vaguer idea such as beauty or authenticity was never rewarded with any kind of material success. Was there any compensation for those living such marginal lives? Nicholson makes the case that for many, a life dedicated to art, romance and freedom is its own reward. For those who embody the bohemian spirit, material comforts and security are not worth the price of suppressing one's creativity and individuality. Bohemia during this era was a radical negation of the conservative Victorian values that were dominant. Similar to the Beatniks of the 1950s and the hippies of the 60s, but to an even greater extent, these early rebels in many ways charted the course for what was to become the modern world. Nicholson presents them as revolutionaries who helped to create a freer and more creative world for everyone. Many of these people lived in abject poverty, and at those days there were few resources to help those who became destitute. There were virtually no government social programs, and relatives were seldom in a position (and often unwilling) to help those who fell between the cracks. The decision to "drop out" of mainstream society had potentially far more dire consequences than for, say, the mostly middle class hippies of the 60s who operated with a safety net of affluent parents, free or very inexpensive education and a growing economy (arguably, we may now be moving back towards a harsher economic climate similar to the Victorian times, at least for those outside the mainstream).
Among the Bohemians is a very readable, informative and enjoyable look at bohemians, who are always among the most interesting and creative members of any society.
Rating:
Summary: passionate..insane...wild and free
Review: There is a madness that lives in all artists, I think, and the 'Bohemians' were all driven to 'BE' artists sometimes beyond their talents, abilities and mental health. Starvingly poor reveling in their personal and sexual abandon, they attempted to smash through the rigid artificiality of the classed society. Free will, Free art, Free love everything was going to be different. (In someways they remind me of the free love 'hippie' movements of the 60's). This book does a very competent job of capturing the elan, their wild joys and deep sorrows, the very 'living' that would lead some many of them to early deaths. Most of them are almost forgotten now strange relics of a seemingly far distant social past. This book brings them and their frantic movement to chaotic life
Rating: 
Summary: Squalid But Fascinating Lives
Review: Virginia Nicholson's "Among the Bohemians" is an evocative account of the revolt against Victorian and Edwardian values engaged in by the artists and writers of the early 20th Century. The freedom from the constraints of convention that these bohemians fought for was won at a price - and the price was usually poverty, disease and, more often than not, a squalid and disquieting end. Given the desperate nature of their lives, and their sometimes shocking deaths, the amazing thing is that the book is a fun read. Nicholson is an engaging prose stylist who knows how to pluck out that little detail that will interest her reader. It's not enough, for example, to point out that the artist Eric Gill engaged in incestuous relations with his daughters - he also refused to wear underwear. Dylan Thomas preferred to steal shirts from friends and acquaintances rather than launder the ones he had. The painter Augustus John leapt on just about every female in sight, and went about in his younger days like a bedraggled gypsy. There are some omissions. I would have liked Nicholson to have included George Gissing's "The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft," simply because it includes so much of the essence of what these people thought and felt, and not to mention Quentin Crisp, the author of "The Naked Civil Servant," is a definite loss to the book. "Among the Bohemians" is a bit too British and Bloomsbury-centric (understandable enough, given that Nicholson's grandmother was Vanessa Bell and her great-aunt Virginia Woolf), and the Americans who came over to Europe between the wars are practically ignored, but given the limits of what she's chosen to work with, it's a splendid job. Like it or not, though, we live in the world that the rebels that Nicholson describes brought about. Our attitudes about just about everything are a lot more free-spirited and a lot less censorious than they would have been a century ago, and we owe those people who paid the price of their rebellion for the social freedoms that too many of us take for granted. That's reason enough, I think, to read this book.
Rating:
Summary: Squalid But Fascinating Lives
Review: Virginia Nicholson's "Among the Bohemians" is an evocative account of the revolt against Victorian and Edwardian values engaged in by the artists and writers of the early 20th Century. The freedom from the constraints of convention that these bohemians fought for was won at a price - and the price was usually poverty, disease and, more often than not, a squalid and disquieting end. Given the desperate nature of their lives, and their sometimes shocking deaths, the amazing thing is that the book is a fun read. Nicholson is an engaging prose stylist who knows how to pluck out that little detail that will interest her reader. It's not enough, for example, to point out that the artist Eric Gill engaged in incestuous relations with his daughters - he also refused to wear underwear. Dylan Thomas preferred to steal shirts from friends and acquaintances rather than launder the ones he had. The painter Augustus John leapt on just about every female in sight, and went about in his younger days like a bedraggled gypsy. There are some omissions. I would have liked Nicholson to have included George Gissing's "The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft," simply because it includes so much of the essence of what these people thought and felt, and not to mention Quentin Crisp, the author of "The Naked Civil Servant," is a definite loss to the book. "Among the Bohemians" is a bit too British and Bloomsbury-centric (understandable enough, given that Nicholson's grandmother was Vanessa Bell and her great-aunt Virginia Woolf), and the Americans who came over to Europe between the wars are practically ignored, but given the limits of what she's chosen to work with, it's a splendid job. Like it or not, though, we live in the world that the rebels that Nicholson describes brought about. Our attitudes about just about everything are a lot more free-spirited and a lot less censorious than they would have been a century ago, and we owe those people who paid the price of their rebellion for the social freedoms that too many of us take for granted. That's reason enough, I think, to read this book.
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