Age of Anxiety 1920's

Paul Valéry

      The 1920's were known as the "Age of Anxiety" due to the after affects of the war and the economical and phycological standpoint of Europe durring that time.  After World War I, people began to dwell of the anxiety which they felt towards their existence, culture and destiny.  Everyone was beginning to question whether or not everything they ever knew was true of not. Even though the war was over the the Military Crisis had ended, the economic crisis still loomed over Europe's head which helped bring forth the "Crisis of the Mind".  Paul Valéry was one of the first to claim that Europe was in an "Age of Anxiety" in the early 1920's.  Later, Protestant theologian-philosopher Paul Tillich again referred to the 1920's as the Age of Anxiety.  He believed that this anxiety affected some fo the greatest artistic, literary and philosophical achievements by Europeans to this day.


"Today, it has become almost a truism to call our time an age of anxiety."- Paul Tillich