What is a Bohemian?
A bohemian is a person who lives an artistic lifestyle, placing freedom of self-expression above all other desires, including wealth, social conformity and status. The term originated in France during the 19th century due to the influx of gypsies believed to be traveling from Czech Republic’s, Bohemia. The term quickly became generalized, however, indicative of a lifestyle rather than a nationality. In the United States, the Beat generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the ‘60s reflected the bohemian subculture in many ways. Writers, artists, poets, musicians and philosophers could commonly be found leading bohemian lifestyles in 19th century Paris, France. Drugs, alcohol and a freer attitude towards sexual expression were considered part of the subculture. Often lacking money, bohemians commonly found lodging in older, run down sections of town. This may have led to the perception that they were not always personally well kept. Nevertheless, the thoughtful and expressive lifestyle
Main Page History –Definition –Hugo –Murger Culture: –Geography • Sorbonne • Gardens –Food –Careers: • Painters • Students • Writers –Housing –Budgets –Style –Women Philosophies: –Revolutions Arts: –Literature: • Les Miserables • Vie de Boheme • Horace • Trilby –Music: • Les Miserables • La Boheme • Rent Bibliography A young Bohemian gypsy, from the cover of Isabel Fonseca’s book Bury Me Standing: The Gypsies and Their Journey. Thackeray’s The Paris Sketch Book, xxx. Bohemia is a region of Czech Republic; the nomadic, often vilified, group called the Gypsies or Romany are called “bohemiens” in French. How did this word come to describe the poor artists of Paris in the nineteenth century? Henry Murger tried to distance himself and his subjects from the Gypsies, emphasizing in his preface to Scenes de la Vie de Boheme that “The Bohemians of whom it is a question in this book have no connection with the Bohemians whom melodramatists have rendered synonymous with robbers and a
The literal definition and original meaning of the term “Bohemian,” is a native or inhabitant of the region and former province of western Czechoslovakia. However, the term as it applies to the arts is a timeless concept that knows no geogrpahic boundaries. In this context, Bohemia is not a place on a map but any community of people whose paramount interest is literary or artistic in nature. Consequently, due to this interest, the lifestyle of the Bohemian tends to differ dramatically from what might be considered to be established norms. In fact, Bohemia can be pinpointed on the abstract map. According to Alphone de Calonne, in his 1852 work, Voyage au pays de Boheme, “The land of Bohemia is a sad country, bounded on the North by need, on the South by poverty, on the East by illusion, and on the West by the hospital. It is irrigated by two inexhaustible streams: imprudence and shame.” If this is the location, then what of its inhabitants? In 1904 George Sterling, the San Francisco rom
