During the World War II era, America's pop culture reflected the tumultuous times with a blend of patriotism, escapism, and social commentary across various mediums, including books, movies, music, and fine arts.
In literature, novels such as "The Grapes of Wrath" by John Steinbeck captured the struggles of the Great Depression while also addressing themes of social injustice and the resilience of the human spirit. Authors like Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald continued to explore themes of love, loss, and disillusionment in their works, providing a sense of solace and reflection amidst the chaos of war.
In cinema, Hollywood produced many films that entertained and informed audiences. War-themed movies such as "Casablanca," "Mrs. Miniver," and "Sergeant York" depicted heroism, sacrifice, and the moral complexities of conflict. At the same time, comedies like "Arsenic and Old Lace" provided much-needed comic relief. Animated films from Disney, such as "Dumbo" and "Bambi," offered moments of innocence and whimsy amidst the grim realities of war.
Music during this era served as a powerful form of expression and unity. Big band music dominated the airwaves, with iconic figures like Glenn Miller and Duke Ellington providing the soundtrack to the war effort. Songs like "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy" and "Sentimental Journey" lifted spirits and boosted morale. At the same time, patriotic anthems like "God Bless America" and "The Star-Spangled Banner" instilled a sense of national pride.
In the world of fine arts, American artists grappled with the impact of war on society and culture. Artists like Edward Hopper captured the loneliness and isolation of urban life, while others, such as Norman Rockwell, depicted scenes of American life with warmth and nostalgia.
Overall, America's pop culture during the World War II era reflected the complexities of the times, providing both escapism and social commentary while rallying the nation behind the war effort and celebrating the enduring spirit of the American people.
Dr. Spock's Baby and Child Care (Originally published in 1946) by
A standard manual that has been frequently revised. This is the 1985 edition.
The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter (Originally published in 1940) by
Selected by the Modern Library as one of the 100 best novels of all time * One of The Atlantic's Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years When she was only twenty-three, Carson McCullers's first novel created a literary sensation. She was very special, one of America's superlative writers who conjures up a vision of existence as terrible as it is real, who takes us on shattering voyages into the depths of the spiritual isolation that underlies the human condition. This novel is the work of a supreme artist, Carson McCullers's enduring masterpiece. The heroine is the strange young girl, Mick Kelly. The setting is a small Southern town, the cosmos universal and eternal. The characters are the damned, the voiceless, the rejected. Some fight their loneliness with violence and depravity, some with sex or drink, and some--like Mick--with a quiet, intensely personal search for beauty.
The Hour Before the Dawn (Originally published in 1942) by
In 1923 in England, General Hetherton is instructing his grandson Jim to shoot a rifle. Jim's dog runs in the way and Jim accidentally kills him. The incident affects him deeply and he becomes a pacifist.
Years later, at the commencement of World War II, Jim is headmaster at a school and has fallen in love with a young Austrian woman, Dora Bruckman, who works for his sister-in-law, May. He is unaware that Dora is a Nazi spy. She meets regularly with her supervisors in London, Mrs. Müller and Kurt van der Breughel, who are posing as Austrian refugees.
John Steinbeck: Novels 1942-1952 by
This third volume in The Library of America's authoritative edition of John Steinbeck's writings shows one of America's most enduring popular writers continuing restlessly to explore new subject matter and new approaches to storytelling. The Moon Is Down (1942), set in an unnamed Scandinavian country under German occupation, dramatizes the transformation of ordinary life under totalitarian rule and the underground struggle against the Nazi invaders.In Cannery Row (1945) Steinbeck paid tribute to his closest friend, the marine biologist Ed Ricketts, in the central character of Doc, proprietor of the Western Biological Laboratory and spiritual and financial mainstay of a cast of philosophical drifters and hangers-on. The comic and bawdy evocation of the main street of Monterey's sardine-canning district has made this one of the most popular of all Steinbeck's novels. Steinbeck's long involvement with Mexican culture is distilled in The Pearl (1947). Expanding on an anecdote he had heard about a boy who found a pearl of unusual size, Steinbeck turned it into an allegory of the corrupting influence of sudden wealth. The Pearl appears here with the original illustrations by José Clemente Orozco. Ambitious in scale and original in structure, East of Eden (1952) recounts the violent and emotionally turbulent history of a Salinas Valley family through several generations. Drawing on Biblical parallels, East of Eden is an epic that explores the writer's deepest and most anguished concerns within a landscape that for him had mythic resonance. LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation's literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America's best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.
The Little Prince (Originally published 1943) by
In the exquisite imagery of this fairy tale, the poet-writer shares with children something of the mystic's vision and wisdom of life.--New York Public Library.
The Naked and the Dead by
A powerful, graphic World War II novel that takes place off an island in the South Pacific.
Put Out More Flags by
Put Out More Flags is Waugh's superb send-up of "smart" England, the bohemian crowd, as World War II approaches. Making a return appearance, Basil Seal this time insinuates himself into an odd but profitable role in the country's mobilization.
Upper-class scoundrel Basil Seal, mad, bad, and dangerous to know, creates havoc wherever he goes, much to the despair of the three women in his life - his sister, his mother, and his mistress. When Neville Chamberlain declares war on Germany, it seems the perfect opportunity for more action and adventure. So Basil follows the call to arms and sets forth to enjoy his finest hour - as a war hero.
Richard Wright's Native Son (Originally published 1940) by
Richard Wright's Native Son (1940) is one of the most violent and revolutionary works in the American canon. Controversial and compelling, its account of crime and racism remain the source of profound disagreement both within African-American culture and throughout the world. This guide to Wright's provocative novel offers: an accessible introduction to the text and contexts of Native Son a critical history, surveying the many interpretations of the text from publication to the present a selection of reprinted critical essays on Native Son, by James Baldwin, Hazel Rowley, Antony Dawahare, Claire Eby and James Smethurst, providing a range of perspectives on the novel and extending the coverage of key critical approaches identified in the survey section a chronology to help place the novel in its historical context suggestions for further reading. Part of the Routledge Guides to Literature series, this volume is essential reading for all those beginning detailed study of Native Son and seeking not only a guide to the novel, but a way through the wealth of contextual and critical material that surrounds Wright's text.
Selected Poems (Poems from the original A Street in Brownzeville published in 1945 can be found here) by
A selection of this poet's work dealing principally with the place of Black America in society.
Slaughterhouse-Five by
Kurt Vonnegut's masterpiece, Slaughterhouse-Five is "a desperate, painfully honest attempt to confront the monstrous crimes of the twentieth century" (Time). Selected by the Modern Library as one of the 100 best novels of all time Slaughterhouse-Five, an American classic, is one of the world's great antiwar books. Centering on the infamous World War II firebombing of Dresden, the novel is the result of what Kurt Vonnegut described as a twenty-three-year struggle to write a book about what he had witnessed as an American prisoner of war. It combines historical fiction, science fiction, autobiography, and satire in an account of the life of Billy Pilgrim, a barber's son turned draftee turned optometrist turned alien abductee. As Vonnegut had, Billy experiences the destruction of Dresden as a POW. Unlike Vonnegut, he experiences time travel, or coming "unstuck in time." An instant bestseller, Slaughterhouse-Five made Kurt Vonnegut a cult hero in American literature, a reputation that only strengthened over time, despite his being banned and censored by some libraries and schools for content and language. But it was precisely those elements of Vonnegut's writing--the political edginess, the genre-bending inventiveness, the frank violence, the transgressive wit--that have inspired generations of readers not just to look differently at the world around them but to find the confidence to say something about it. Authors as wide-ranging as Norman Mailer, John Irving, Michael Crichton, Tim O'Brien, Margaret Atwood, Elizabeth Strout, David Sedaris, Jennifer Egan, and J. K. Rowling have all found inspiration in Vonnegut's words. Jonathan Safran Foer has described Vonnegut as "the kind of writer who made people--young people especially--want to write." George Saunders has declared Vonnegut to be "the great, urgent, passionate American writer of our century, who offers us . . . a model of the kind of compassionate thinking that might yet save us from ourselves." More than fifty years after its initial publication at the height of the Vietnam War, Vonnegut's portrayal of political disillusionment, PTSD, and postwar anxiety feels as relevant, darkly humorous, and profoundly affecting as ever, an enduring beacon through our own era's uncertainties.
The Young Lions by
The Young Lions is a vivid and classic novel that portrays the experiences of ordinary soldiers fighting World War II. Told from the points of view of a perceptive young Nazi, a jaded American film producer, and a shy Jewish boy just married to the love of his life, Shaw conveys, as no other novelist has since, the scope, confusion, and complexity of war.
Casablanca
Originally released as a motion picture in 1942.
Bonus features: commentaries, theatrical trailers, additional scenes and outtakes, 2 documentaries, "As time goes by : the children remember" featurette, production research gallery, homage cartoon "Carrotblanca", "Who holes tomorrow?" premiere episode from 1955 tv series, scoring session outtakes, audio-only bonus- radio production with the Movie's 3 key stars, enhanced DVD-ROm features.
Lifeboat
When an their vessel is torpedoed in the Atlantic Ocean during WWII, eight survivors find refuge in a lifeboat. Short on food and water, their situation is further complicated when they rescue a crew member from the German U-boat that sank their ship.
The Maltese Falcon
San Francisco private detective Sam Spade takes on a case that involves him with three eccentric criminals, a gorgeous liar and their quest for a priceless statuette, with the stakes rising after his partner is murdered.
The bells of St. Mary's
Parish priest Father O'Malley is sent to revive the financially ailing parochial school. The easy-going O'Malley is immediately at odds with no-nonsense Sister Benedict on how to educate children. Beyond their delightful battle of wits lies a bigger problem. The skinflint businessman next door wants St. Mary's condemned and only a miracle can save it now.
Double Indemnity
A calculating wife encourages her wealthy husband to sign a double indemnity policy proposed by smitten insurance agent Walter Neff. As the would-be lovers plot the unsuspecting husband's murder, they are pursued by a suspicious claims manager. It's a race against time to get away with the perfect crime in this heart-pounding Academy Award-nominated masterpiece"
My favorite wife
A funny thing happens to Nick on his way to his honeymoon suite. He meets his wife. No, not his bride. He meets the wife that was lost at sea seven years ago and presumed dead.
Meet John Doe
"Gary Cooper portrays a former baseball player whose misfortunes have changed his life. Barbara Stanwyck, a news reporter, interviews "John Doe" (Cooper). Her report falls into the hands of a crooked politician who exploits "John Doe" by making him a good will ambassador in a phony political drive, leaving Cooper on the brink of suicide. This film represents director Frank Capra at his best."
Sounds of War by
What role did music play in the United States during World War II? How did composers reconcile the demands of their country and their art as America mobilized both militarily and culturally for war?Annegret Fauser explores these and many other questions in the first in-depth study of American concert music during World War II. While Dinah Shore, Duke Ellington, and the Andrew Sisters entertained civilians at home and G.I.s abroad with swing and boogie-woogie, Fauser shows it was classicalmusic that truly distinguished musical life in the wartime United States. Classical music in 1940s America had a ubiquitous cultural presence - whether as an instrument of propaganda or a means of entertainment, recuperation, and uplift - that is hard to imagine today, and Fauser suggests that noother war enlisted culture in general and music in particular so consciously and unequivocally as World War II.Indeed, the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Group Theatre director Harold Clurman wrote to his cousin, Aaron Copland: "So you're back in N.Y. . . ready to defend your country in her hour of need with lectures, books, symphonies!" Copland was in fact involved in propaganda missions of theOffice of War Information, as were Marc Blitzstein, Elliott Carter, Henry Cowell, Roy Harris, and Colin McPhee. It is the works of these musical greats - as well as many other American and exiled European composers who put their talents to patriotic purposes - that form the core of Fauser'senlightening account.Drawing on music history, aesthetics, reception history, and cultural history, Sounds of War recreates the remarkable sonic landscape of the World War II era and offers fresh insight to the role of music during wartime.
Culture and propaganda in World War II : music, film and the battle for national identity by
The wartime period in Britain is now seen as an extremely fertile period of British creativity in music, film and art. Often, these projects were funded and supported by the government, who saw its role as a custodian of British culture, and by extension, of British values, at a time when those values seemed under great threat. In the late thirties the Nazi Party had stressed the superiority of Germanic culture and the promotion of Richard Wagner and Carl Orff was central to Hitler's cultural program. In Britain, the War Office under Winston Churchill chose to promote Edward Elgar and Hubert Parry, but also to appropriate and 'de-Nazify' Ludwig van Beethoven- whose Fifth Symphony was used extensively in wartime broadcasts and has since become synonymous with VE Day. Meanwhile, the work of Ralph Vaughn Williams, whose music was commissioned by Powell and Pressburger for use in 49th Parallel, reclaimed a particularly English past stretching back to the Tudors.While artists such as John Piper, Eric Ravillious and Evelyn Dunbar produced works specifically commissioned by the state which were intended to commemorate and glorify Britain, the British Council and the BBC played an active role in commissioning and broadcasting their musical equivalents. In film, Humphrey Jenning's documentaries were designed to further push the wartime agenda, along with films produced by Ealing Studios. Here, John Morris assesses the history of this body of work, shedding new light on the period. A cultural history of music in wartime based on detailed archival research, Culture and Propaganda in World War II is essential reading for historians of the period, musicians, film scholars and propaganda analysts.
Music of the World War II Era by
In the World War II era, big bands and swing music reached the heights of popularity with soldiers as well as friends and loved ones back home. Many entertainers such as Glenn Miller also served in the military, or supported the war effort with bond drives and entertaining the troops at home and abroad. In addition to big band and swing music, musicals, jazz, blues, gospel and country music were also popular. Chapters on each, along with an analysis of the evolution of record companies, records, radios, and television are included here, for students, historians, and fans of the era. Includes a timeline of the music of the era, an appendix of the Broadway and Hollywood Musicals, 1939-1945, and an appendix of Songs, Composers, and lyricists, 1939-1945. An extensive discography and bibliography, along with approximately 35 black and white photos, complete the volume.
The jazz war : radio, Nazism and the struggle for the airwaves in World War II by
During World War II, jazz embodied everything that was appealing about a democratic society as envisioned by the Western Allied powers. Labelled `degenerate' by Hitler's cultural apparatus, jazz was adopted by the Allies to win the hearts and minds of the German public. It was also used by the Nazi Minister for Propaganda, Joseph Goebbels, to deliver a message of Nazi cultural and military superiority. When Goebbels co-opted young German and foreign musicians into `Charlie and his Orchestra' and broadcast their anti-Allied lyrics across the English Channel, jazz took centre stage in the propaganda war that accompanied World War II on the ground. The Jazz War is based on the largely unheard oral testimony of the personalities behind the German and British wartime radio broadcasts, and chronicles the evolving relationship between jazz music and the Axis and Allied war e orts. Studdert shows how jazz both helped and hindered the Allied cause as Nazi soldiers secretly tuned in to British radio shows while London party-goers danced the night away in demimonde `bottle parties', leading them to be branded a `menace' in Parliament. This book will appeal to students of the history of jazz, broadcasting, cultural studies, and the history of World War II.
The songs that fought the war : popular music and the home front, 1939-1945 by
Poet Rod McKuen once observed that "1939-1945 was a terrible time for the world, but it was a glorious time for songs and fighter pilots." Anyone who was alive during World War II remembers with fondness the music of the period. Songs such as "I'll Be Seeing You," "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy," "It's Been A Long, Long Time," and "Praise The Lord And Pass The Ammunition" became standards that are still around today. But what's most amazing about the popular songs of the war years is just how many there were. World War II was one of the most fertile periods of American popular songwriting; it was also the heyday of such "big bands" as those of Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey, Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, and Harry James, and of vocalists such as Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, Dinah Shore, Kitty Kallen, and, of course, the Andrews Sisters. This outpouring of music included romantic ballads, rhythm numbers, dance tunes, and novelty songs, and the war itself occasioned the writing, publishing, recording, and performance of thousands of war-inspired songs. Professionals wrote virtually all of the wartime songs we still sing today, but thousands of other numbers were written by inspired (or not-so-inspired) amateurs: men, women, and even children eager to express their patriotism through lyric and melody. Although a central part of home front popular culture during World War II, these war-related and war-inspired songs had never been systematically analyzed or interpreted. In The Songs That Fought The War, John Bush Jones examines hundreds of these tunes in the context of the times. He begins with a look at the contemporary music industry and the astonishing array of songwriters (including amateurs) prior to Pearl Harbor and during the war. Then he turns to songs written and popularized before Pearl Harbor, including tunes that touted isolationism and patriotism in the late 1930s, songs written by Americans about the European allies, and songs from England that became popular in the United States. Post-Pearl Harbor tunes included songs about the draft, enlistment, army life, national pride, and a few about wartime personalities such as FDR and MacArthur. Humorous songs about shortages, rationing, and Victory Gardens and sentimental ballads about boys abroad missing girls back home (and vice versa) expressed home front anxieties and efforts, not least of which was the German hit among both the Allies and the Axis, "Lili Marlene."
Music in the Holocaust : confronting life in the Nazi ghettos and camps by
In Music in the Holocaust Shirli Gilbert provides the first large-scale, critical account of the role of music amongst communities imprisoned under Nazism. She documents a wide scope of musical activities, ranging from orchestras and chamber groups to choirs, theatres, communal sing-songs, andcabarets, in some of the most important internment centres in Nazi-occupied Europe, including Auschwitz and the Warsaw and Vilna ghettos. Gilbert is also concerned with exploring the ways in which music - particularly the many songs that were preserved - contribute to our broader understanding ofthe Holocaust and the experiences of its victims. Music in the Holocaust is, at its core, a social history, taking as its focus the lives of individuals and communities imprisoned under Nazism. Music opens a unique window on to the internal world of those communities, offering insight into how theyunderstood, interpreted, and responded to their experiences at the time.
American abstract art of the 1930's and 1940's : the J. Donald Nichols collection by
"After attending Wake Forest University on an athletic scholarship, J. Donald Nichols played professional baseball with the Baltimore Orioles. From there he went into the real estate development business. He has built more than 175 shopping centers throughout the country, and his company, JDN Realty, is listed on the New York Stock Exchange." "Nichols first began collecting American Impressionist paintings in the 1970s, buying one painting as his personal reward for each shopping center he built. After ten years, he began looking for a new area in which to collect." "The J. Donald Nichols Collection is now recognized as perhaps the finest collection of American abstract art of the 1930s and 1940s ever assembled."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved
American chronicles : the art of Norman Rockwell by
American Chronicles: The Art of Norman Rockwell explores Norman Rockwell's unparalleled role as an American icon-maker and storyteller. The book, a catalogue to a special exhibition at the Norman Rockwell Museum, traces the evolution of Rockwell's art and iconography throughout his career-- from carefully choreographed reflections on childhood innocence in such paintings as No Swimming (1921) to powerful, consciousness-raising images like The Problem We All Live With (1964), which documented the traumatic realities of desegregation in the South. American Chronicles demonstrates how Rockwell's images provided Americans with a vocabulary for describing and celebrating themselves, their country, and their experiences in the twentieth century. Written in an engaging style and from an insider's point of view, the book begins with Rockwell's early life, student years, and career in Manhattan, Mamaroneck, and New Rochelle, New York. In subsequent chapters, the author explores Rockwell's life and artworks when he lived in Arlington, Vermont, and later in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, where he enjoyed the life of a famous working artist for his last 25 years. Of special interest to Rockwell aficionados will be the color reproductions of Rockwell's art, color-corrected to the Museum's original paintings. Readers will delight in an array of intriguing archival portraits of Rockwell throughout his life. Many of these images are being published for the first time, for they existed until now only as fragile negatives on acetate film in the Museum's archive. The creation of his 1965 painting Murder in Mississippi is told in step-by- step detail, illuminating the artist's working process. Research materials, handwritten notes, reference photographs, preliminary studies, the final painting, the published image in the magazine tear sheet, and portraits of the artist in the midst of creation all make for a captivating and in-depth documentation of Rockwell's working process and methods. The book concludes with 28 pages of rarely or never-before-seen black-and-white photographs of Rockwell's studios from the Museum's comprehensive photographic collection. Photographs by Rockwell's assistants Gene Pelham, Louie Lamone, and Bill Scovill capture the artist and his models at work during the height of his career.
American painters on technique : 1860-1945 by
This book, like the authors' previous volume on American painting materials and techniques from the colonial period to 1860, is the first overview of an important but largely unknown aspect of American art from 1860 to 1945. The study is based primarily on firsthand descriptions of the materials and techniques that artists used to make paintings. It is written to be accessible and interesting to curators, art historians, and painters, as well as conservators. The period covered in this book is best understood divided roughly into two parts: 1860 to 1910 and 1910 to 1945. Between 1860 and 1910, the predominant theme is the increased number of Americans who traveled to Europe for instruction, resulting in an explosion of transplanted techniques. The lessons they learned there were often recombined in unique ways as they developed their own styles. We know about their approaches from letters, diaries, colormen's catalogues, books, and other printed sources. The following period, from 1910 to 1945, saw a much greater increase in books and other printed sources of information. It was marked by a fundamental change in the attitudes of painters toward their materials. Artists began to turn away from commercially made products and began once again to make their own media and grounds from raw materials. Because of the explosion of information in the twentieth century, the authors moved away from devoting chapters to individual artists and instead included short sections on techniques of many different artists, interwoven with discussions of more general topics. An epilogue summarizes the lessons American painters' experiences over 250 years can hold for contemporary artists interested in the long-term preservation of their paintings.
American Women Painters of the 1930s and 1940s by
Doris Lee -- Loren MacIver -- Marion Greenwood -- Doris Rosenthal -- Andree Ruellan -- Mabel Dwight -- Helen Sawyer -- Gladys Rockmore Davis -- Edna Reindel -- Lauren Ford.
Animation under the swastika a history of trickfilm in Nazi Germany, 1933-1945 by 
Art and the Second World War by
A richly illustrated, comprehensive, and accessible account of the art of World War II Art and the Second World War is the first book in English to provide a comprehensive and detailed international overview of the complex and often disturbing relationship between war and the fine arts during this crucial period of modern history. This generously illustrated volume starts by examining the art produced in reaction to the Spanish Civil War (often viewed as "the first battle of World War II"), and then looks at painting, sculpture, prints, and drawing in each of the major combatant nations, including Japan and China. Breathtaking in scope, this scholarly yet accessible publication places wartime art within its broader cultural, political, and military contexts while never losing sight of the power and significance of the individual image and the individual artist. Monica Bohm-Duchen's thought-provoking analysis ranges from iconic paintings such as Picasso's Guernica to unfamiliar works by little-known artists. She reinstates war art by major artists as an integral part of their oeuvres and examines neglected topics such as the art produced in the Japanese-American and British internment camps, by victims of the Holocaust, and in response to the dropping of the atom bomb in 1945. In so doing, Bohm-Duchen addresses a host of fundamental issues, including the relationship between art and propaganda and between art and atrocity, and the role of gender, religion, and censorship, both external and internal. Art and the Second World War offers an unparalleled comparative perspective that will appeal to anyone interested in art history, military history, or political and cultural studies.
Artists of World War II by
The first global survey of art in WWII, this volume features selected biographies of artists and detailed discussions of war-era art worlds in China, France, Italy, Japan, Germany, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, Spain, and the United States. Readers can compare and contrast artists' experiences of war in these different countries. They will observe the artists' wide range of responses to war, from producing art works that actively supported the war effort, to criticism of death and destruction. Chapters begin with short synopses of the art worlds in each of these countries leading up to World War II. Following this are approximately five detailed biographies of selected artists whose works exhibited a wide range of responses to the war efforts of their nation. Their works cover a range of artistic styles, from traditional to modern, and demonstrate the blurred boundaries of art and propaganda during this period. The influence of their works on World War II and how their communities, and the world, responded to those works, gives readers a unique view on the powerful influence of art in war.
Beyond Rosie the Riveter : Women of World War II in American Popular Graphic Art by
The iconic bicep-flexing poster image of "Rosie the Riveter" has long conveyed the impression that women were welcomed into the World War II work force and admired for helping "free a man to fight." Donna Knaff, however, shows that "Rosie" only revealed part of the reality and that women depicted in other World War II visual art--both in the private sector and the military--reflected decidedly mixed feelings about the status of women within American society. Beyond Rosie the Riveter takes readers back to a time before television's dominance, to the golden age of print art and its singular power over public opinion. Focusing specifically on instances of "female masculinity" when women entered previously all-male fields, Knaff places these images within the context of popular discussions of gender roles and examines their historical, cultural, and textual contexts. As Knaff reveals, visual messages received by women through war posters, magazine cartoons, comic strips, and ads may have acknowledged their importance to the war effort but also cautioned them against taking too many liberties or losing their femininity. Her study examines the subtle and not-so subtle cultural battles that played out in these popular images, opening a new window on American women's experience. Some images implicitly argued that women should maintain their femininity despite adopting masculinity for the war effort; others dealt with society's deep-seated fear that masculinized women might feminize men; and many reflected the dilemma that a woman was both encouraged to express and suppress her sexuality so that she might be perceived as neither promiscuous nor lesbian. From these cases, Knaff draws a common theme: while being outwardly empowered or celebrated for their wartime contributions, women were kept in check by being held responsible for everything from distracting male co-workers to compromising machinery with their long hair and jewelry. Knaff also notes the subtle distinctions among the images: government war posters targeted blue-collar women, New Yorker content was aimed at socialites, Collier's addressed middle-class women, and Wonder Woman was geared to young girls. Especially through its focus on visual arts, Knaff's book gives us a new look at American society decades before the modern women's rights movement, torn between wartime needs and antiquated gender roles. It provides much-needed nuance to a glossed-over chapter in our history, charting the difficult negotiations that granted--and ultimately took back--American women's wartime freedoms.
Dr. Seuss goes to war : the World War II editorial cartoons of Theodor Seuss Geisel by
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