Finding the Lost Generation

By Catherine Zandonella

Shakespeare and Company book shop, Paris.
Shakespeare and Company, an English-language book shop and lending library in Paris. Photo courtesy of Princeton University Library

A new interactive website provides scholars and the public with insights into the Lost Generation, a group of writers and artists that came of age during World War I. The website is based on records, housed at the Princeton University Library, from Shakespeare and Company, an English-language book shop and lending library in Paris. During the 1920s and ’30s, writers such as Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, and others borrowed and purchased books from the shop. Created by Joshua Kotin, associate professor of English, in collaboration with graduate and undergraduate students and Princeton’s Center for Digital Humanities, the Shakespeare and Company Project makes available borrowing histories, financial transactions, maps, and other documents.
Visit shakespeareandco.princeton.edu.