Douglas Coupland’s ‘Generation X’ Serves as a Literary Time Capsule
The classic novel by Canadian writer Douglas Coupland explores the salad years of Gen X in 1990s America
As I continue to expand my appreciation for intergenerational literacy, it’s invigorating to study the time periods of yesterday. How, in any given decade, Americans of various age groups were dealing with their own unique obstacles. We also can learn how those dynamics are tied to global conflict.
Douglas Coupland, a member of “Generation Jones” well-versed in visual design and the natural sciences, authored the eponymous book just as the term “Generation X” was becoming popularized to refer to those born in the mid-1960s up through the early-1980s. Written and published in 1991, Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture holds up as a regional snapshot of GenXer culture.
Told in the first-person voice of fictional twentysomething Andy Palmer, the book follows Andy and his two close friends, Dagmar “Dag” Bellinghausen (a native Canadian) and Claire Baxter. The trio resides in a housing unit of Palm Springs bungalows; Andy and Dag are bartenders, and Claire works in retail.
The nexus of this story is how these three platonic friends ruminate over their present and future. They…
