Loreto College’s first ever literary fest, ‘Jazzonia’, was held in the American Center on the 28th of January 2020. The event, named after a poem by the renowned American poet Langston Hughes, was an acknowledgement as well as celebration of the hundredth anniversary of the beginning of the Jazz Age. Organised by the Department of English in collaboration with The American Center, Kolkata, ‘Jazzonia’ was an enriching exploration of the gaiety of the Jazz Age, as well as its challenges and socio-political significance.

Monica Shie, Director of the American Center, expressed her pleasure in hosting ‘Jazzonia’ in her welcome address. Dr. Sudipto Sanyal in his keynote address associated jazz with robustness as well as jittering instability, as it was an age riddled with political activity and economic expansion of alarming proportions. His research discussed Prohibition, and its connotations, the music and club culture that was fraught with racism, as well as the mass movement of Americans from the country to the cities of the Midwest. A inter-college Jazz Age themed quiz was conducted by Mr. Soumyadip Chowdhury where Women’s Christian College was placed first, with Loreto College as the runner up.

The Costume Play (Cos-Play), written, directed and performed by the students of the English Department featured icons of the American Twenties such as Fitzgerald, Greta Garbo, Al Capone, Louis Armstrong, Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald and Langston Hughes. The play was an amusing interaction of the 21st century sensibility with that of the Roaring Twenties. The final performance was by The Big Other, a band that plays jazz of 20s and 30s. The band was the highlight of the evening, inviting the audience to experience the rhythm, appeal and richness of gypsy and ‘pre-bop’ era jazz music.