By this mojo alone, some thought, the spent-force of white humanity might be saved from itself. Rather, among the British who visited a fashionable notion prevailed: that Negros held an unspoiled vitality. Sojourning there, some of the bright young things came to see “another arrondissement of Paris”.įew noticed overcrowding and poverty, or appreciated that the parents or grandparents of its residents had often been slaves. For a while, Harlem seemed at the center of the bohemian world. Through drink, drugs, sex and social provocation, these “ bright young people” set out to have a good time. After the great war, many in the artistic elite were determined to celebrate simple survival.
