The Beautiful and Damned is a 1922 novel by American writer F. Scott Fitzgerald.[1] Set in New York City, the novel's plot follows a young artist Anthony Patch and his flapper wife Gloria Gilbert who become "wrecked on the shoals of dissipation" while excessively partying at the dawn of the hedonistic Jazz Age.[2][3] As Fitzgerald's second novel, the work focuses upon the swinish behavior and glittering excesses of the American social elite in the heyday of New York's caf society.[4]
Fitzgerald modeled the characters of Anthony Patch on himself and Gloria Gilbert on his newlywed spouse Zelda Fitzgerald.[5] The novel draws circumstantially upon the early years of Fitzgeralds' tempestuous marriage following the unexpected success of the author's first novel This Side of Paradise.[6] At the time of their wedding in 1920, Fitzgerald claimed neither he nor Zelda loved each other,[7][8] and the early years of their marriage in New York City were more akin to a friendship.[9][10]
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Having reflected upon the criticisms of his debut novel This Side of Paradise, Fitzgerald sought to improve upon the form and construction of his prose in The Beautiful and Damned and to venture into a new genre of fiction altogether.[11] Consequently, he revised his second novel based on editorial suggestions from his friend Edmund Wilson and his editor Max Perkins.[12] When reviewing the manuscript, Perkins commended the conspicuous evolution of Fitzgerald's literary craftsmanship.[13]
For the first three years of their married life together, Anthony and Gloria vow to adhere to "the magnificent attitude of not giving a damn... for what they chose to do and what consequences it brought. Not to be sorry, not to lose one cry of regret, to live according to a clear code of honor toward each other, and to seek the moment's happiness as fervently and persistently as possible."[20] Gloria and Anthony's marital bliss soon evaporates, especially when they are each pitted against the other's selfish attitudes. Once the couple's infatuation with each other fades, they begin to see their differences do more harm than good, as well as leaving each other with unfulfilled hopes. Over time, the disappointed couple become hedonistic and cynical libertines.
When Anthony's grandfather learns of Anthony's dissipation, he disinherits him. During World War I, Anthony briefly serves in the American Expeditionary Forces while Gloria remains home alone until his return. While in army training, Anthony has an extramarital liaison with Dot Raycroft, a lower-class Southern woman.[21] After the Allied Powers sign an armistice with Imperial Germany in November 1918, Anthony returns to New York City and reunites with Gloria. When the struggle over the grandfather's inheritance finally concludes, Anthony wins his inheritance. However, he has now become a hopeless alcoholic, and his wife has lost her beauty. The couple are now wealthy but morally and physically ruined.
Following the success of his debut novel This Side of Paradise in March 1920, F. Scott Fitzgerald became a household name.[29] His new fame enabled him to earn much higher rates for his short stories,[30] and his increased financial prospects persuaded his fiance Zelda Sayre to marry him as Fitzgerald could now pay for her accustomed lifestyle.[b][34] Although they were re-engaged, Fitzgerald's feelings for Zelda were at an all-time low, and he remarked to a friend, "I wouldn't care if she died, but I couldn't stand to have anybody else marry her."[35] Despite mutual reservations,[7][9] they married in a simple ceremony on April 3, 1920, at St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York.[36] At the time of their wedding, Fitzgerald claimed neither he nor Zelda still loved each other,[7][8] and the early years of their stormy marriage in New York City were more akin to a friendship.[9][10]
Living in luxury at the Biltmore Hotel in New York City,[37] the newlywed couple became national celebrities, as much for their wild behavior as for the success of Fitzgerald's novel. At the Biltmore, Scott did handstands in the lobby,[38] while Zelda slid down the hotel banisters.[39] After several weeks, the hotel asked them to leave for disturbing other guests.[38] The couple relocated two blocks to the Commodore Hotel on 42nd Street where they spent half-an-hour spinning in the revolving door.[40] Fitzgerald likened their juvenile behavior in New York City to two "small children in a great bright unexplored barn."[41] Writer Dorothy Parker first encountered the couple riding on the roof of a taxi.[42] "They did both look as though they had just stepped out of the sun", Parker recalled, "their youth was striking. Everyone wanted to meet him."[42]
Fitzgerald's ephemeral happiness mirrored the societal giddiness of the Jazz Age, a term which he popularized in his essays and stories.[43] He described the era as racing "along under its own power, served by great filling stations full of money."[44] In Fitzgerald's eyes, the era represented a morally permissive time when Americans became disillusioned with prevailing social norms and obsessed with self-gratification.[45] During this hedonistic era, alcohol increasingly fueled the Fitzgeralds' social life,[46] and the couple consumed gin-and-fruit concoctions at every outing.[38] Publicly, their alcohol intake meant little more than napping at parties, but privately it led to bitter quarrels.[46] As their quarrels worsened, the couple accused each other of marital infidelities.[47] They remarked to friends that their marriage would not last much longer.[48]
In August 1920 while in Westport, Connecticut, Fitzgerald began work on his second novel.[49] The novel had several working titles such as The Beautiful Lady Without Mercy and The Flight of the Rocket.[50] On August 12, Fitzgerald described the plot of the novel to Charles Scribner as focusing upon the life of an artist who lacks creative inspiration and who, after marrying a beautiful woman, is "wrecked on the shoals of dissipation".[49] The writing of the novel was interrupted as his wife Zelda wished to return to the Deep South since "she missed peaches and biscuits for breakfast."[49] After an excursion to Montgomery, Alabama, the couple returned to Westport where Fitzgerald resumed work on his novel.[49] While Fitzgerald worked on his second novel, his wife Zelda realized she was pregnant in February 1921,[51] and the couple began planning a trip overseas to Europe.[51]
Having digested criticisms of his debut novel This Side of Paradise, Fitzgerald sought to improve upon the form and construction of his prose and to venture into a new genre of fiction altogether.[11] Consequently, he revised The Beautiful and Damned based on editorial suggestions from his friend Edmund Wilson and his editor Max Perkins.[12] When reviewing the manuscript, Perkins commended the conspicuous evolution of Fitzgerald's literary craftsmanship.[13] Fitzgerald dedicated the novel to the Irish writer Shane Leslie, George Jean Nathan, and Maxwell Perkins "in appreciation of much literary help and encouragement".[55]
While finalizing the novel, Fitzgerald traveled with his wife to Europe,[51] and his agent Harold Ober sold the serialization rights for The Beautiful and Damned to Metropolitan Magazine for $7,000.[56] The chapters were serialized by Metropolitan from September 1921 to March 1922.[57] Shortly before the novel's publication in book form by Charles Scribner's Sons, Zelda Fitzgerald made a sketch in which she envisioned the dust-jacket for her husband's novel.[28] Her sketch depicted a naked flapper sitting in a cocktail glass.[28] Ultimately, the publisher would use an illustration by William E. Hill for the dust-jacket.[58] On March 4, 1922, the book was published by Scribner's.[a][59] The publisher prepared an initial print run of approximately 20,000 copies,[60] and The Beautiful and Damned sold well enough to warrant additional print runs reaching 50,000 copies.[14]
There is a profounder truth in The Beautiful and Damned than the author perhaps intended to convey: the hero and heroine are strange creatures without purpose or method, who give themselves up to wild debaucheries and do not, from beginning to end perform a single serious act; but you somehow get the impression that, in spite of their madness, they are the most rational people in the book.... The inference is that, in such a civilization, the sanest and most creditable thing is to forget organized society and live for the jazz of the moment.
With his second work, The Beautiful and Damned, Fitzgerald discarded the trappings of collegiate bildungsromans as epitomized in his preceding novel This Side of Paradise and crafted an "ironical-pessimistic" [sic] novel in the style of Thomas Hardy's oeuvre.[62] The relentless pessimism of the novel would become a point of contention with many critics.[63] Louise Field of The New York Times found the novel showed Fitzgerald to be talented but too pessimistic.[63] Likewise, critic Fanny Butcher lamented that Fitzgerald had traded the bubbly giddiness of This Side of Paradise for a sequel which plumbed "the bitter dregs of reality."[64]
With the publication of this sophomore effort, critics promptly noticed an evolution in the artistry and quality of Fitzgerald's prose.[65] Whereas This Side of Paradise had been universally castigated by critics for its chaotic prose, The Beautiful and Damned displayed greater form and construction as well as an awakened literary consciousness.[65] Paul Rosenfeld commented that certain passages easily rivaled D. H. Lawrence in their artistry.[66] Remarking upon Fitzgerald's improved craftsmanship, literary critic H. L. Mencken wrote in his The Smart Set review: "There are a hundred signs in it of serious purpose and unquestionable skill. Even in its defects there is proof of hard striving. Fitzgerald ceases to be a wunderkind, and begins to come into his maturity".[58] 152ee80cbc
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