Alison Morretta - F. Scott Fitzgerald and the Jazz Age

For Bart

Published in 2015 by Cavendish Square Publishing, LLC

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Morretta, Alison.

F. Scott Fitzgerald and the Jazz Age / Alison Morretta. pages cm. (Writers and their times)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-62712-815-5 (hardcover) ISBN 978-1-62712-817-9 (ebook)

1. Fitzgerald, F. Scott (Francis Scott), 1896-1940Criticism and interpretation. 2. United StatesHistory1919-1933. 3.

Nineteen twenties. I. Title.

PS3511.I9Z735 2015 813.52dc23

2014003728

Editorial Director: Dean Miller Editor: Kristen Susienka Senior Copy Editor: Wendy A. Reynolds Art Director: Jeffrey Talbot

Designer: Amy Greenan Production Manager: Jennifer Ryder-Talbot Production Editor: David McNamara Photo Research: J8 Media

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Introduction

ONE

TWO

THREE

FOUR

T he story of F. Scott Fitzgerald is the story of Jazz Age America. A member of The Lost Generation that came of age during World War I, Fitzgeralds rapid rise and fall mirrored the boom and bust of the Roaring Twenties. Where some men invested their life savings in the stock market, Fitzgerald invested everything in his work and his wife, Zelda. Both had disastrous consequences.

Fitzgerald was both a chronicler and a critic of Jazz Age culture. He spent his youth aspiring to fame and success, which he achieved at a very young age with the publication of his first novel, This Side of Paradise, in 1920. The publication of his novel coincided with the beginning of the Roaring Twenties, and the possibilities of the new decade seemed endless for the young author. However, though he enjoyed the lifestyle that accompanied his newfound celebrity, he remained critical of the Jazz Age culture of excess. His traditional Midwestern values stood in stark contrast to the new American Dream of fame and fortune, and he saw the nation in a state of moral decline.

Uniformed bartenders serve alcohol to customers in a New York City speakeasy in 1933, shortly before the repeal of Prohibition.

His work is a testament to his conflicting attitudes about the time he lived in.

The Jazz Age was a time of great change in American culture. A booming economy gave the impression that money was there for the taking. The ban on alcohol during Prohibition made millionaires out of criminals. The modern woman emerged as a cultural symbol and attitudes toward sexuality and gender roles were changing. It was in this environment that Fitzgerald came of age, and his work can be read as both a social history of his time and a critique of it.

While Fitzgerald became famous for his realistic portrayal of Jazz Age culture, he also became an alcoholic. Despite his literary success, he always found himself in need of money, and he came to further resent the culture that valued wealth and success above all things. Fitzgeralds own pursuit of the new American Dream left him broke and in poor health, and by the time of the Great Stock Market Crash in 1929, his career and his life were in shambles.