The thirties: a dream revolved

Julian Symons here presents a unique view of the 1930s. Rejecting the standard historical line, he instead examines the decade as an artistic movement using sources as diverse as the ‘Communist Daily Worker’ and the ‘Fascist Action’, together with a wealth of contemporary prose and poetry. His sympathetic treatment of the material allows a picture of the hopes and aspirations of Britain’s young artists to emerge, and through this, he poignantly reveals their wilful belief that the social difficulties of the time were necessary as a herald of society’s glorious rebirth.