Steppin' Out: New York Nightlife and the Transformation of American Culture

Steppin' Out: New York Nightlife and the Transformation of American Culture

Product Type: Book

Product Price: $27.50

Manufacturer: University Of Chicago Press

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Description

The evolution of New York nightlife from the Gay Nineties through the Jazz Age was, as Lewis A. Erenberg shows, both symbol and catalyst of America's transition out of the Victorian period. Cabaret culture led the way to new styles of behavior and consumption, dissolving conventional barriers between classes, races, the sexes—even between life and art. A fabulous era of chorus girls, jazz players, lobster palaces, and hip flasks—the age of Sophie Tucker, Irene and Vernon Castle, and Gilda Gray—tangos through the pages of this ground-breaking, as well as entertaining, cultural history.

Reviews

Rating: 1 / 5
Date: 2009-05-30
Summary: "More transformation of culture than nightlife"

There is an unfortunate dearth of books on the nightlife of NYC from the teens through the twenties. This book gives a decent general overview, but I wanted more specific names and dates of cabarets, tea dansants venues, revues and the eventual speakeasies. I am looking for owners, hours of operation, names of entertainers and when they performed, menues and descriptions of the actual rooms and buildings in which it all took place. Though interesting, I was not seeking a treatise on women's rights, and the "transformation of culture". Though well-written and at times thought-provoking, this book is two-thirds social history and only one-third about the actual venues and entertainers. The other review did not mention this, so I hope this will be helpful to someone like myself who is seeking the who, what's and when's more than the why's.

Rating: 5 / 5
Date: 2003-11-30
Summary: "wonderful"

there simply isn't a better resource on the topic of nightclubs and other popular entertainment in NYC during this time. i highly recommend it.