Strange Bedfellows: The First American Avant-Garde

New York: Abbeville Press, 1991. Cloth, 439 pages, illustrations (some colour), portraits; 27 cm. Near fine. Firm binding, clean inside copy. Spine slightly rolled at the crown. Stated First edition. Dust jacket protected in a mylar book cover. OVERSIZE! No priority/international, except by special arrangement. Bohemianism in America, early-20th-century New York. "This book tells the story of the first American avant-garde in art, poetry and the theatre. The people discussed in this book include Ezra Pound, Gertrude Stein, Marcel Duchamp and the Stettheimer sisters. The author suggests that this exchange of ideas transformed modern culture. Quotations from letters, diaries and interviews enliven this history. The development of the avant-garde depended as much on social intercourse, whether sexual, suppressed or platonic, as on aesthetics. By the time of the 1913 Armory Show, bohemia had made a home for itself in New York's Greenwich Village." - Publisher. CONTENTS: Before 1913: cradles of modernism. Chicago; Harvard; Paris; London; New York; Florence; Portrait gallery; 1913-1914. Village I: new Bohemia on Washington Square; Art I: explosion in the Armory; Poetry I: the Imagist wars; Entr'acte; 1914-1917. Village II: the selling of Bohemia; Art II: New York hosts tout le monde; Poetry II: new battles; 1917 & after. April 1917: war begins and an era ends; Aftermath: the avant-garde moves on.. 1st. Hardcover. Very Good/Fine. 4to. Collectible.