F.Scott Fitzgerald

3. Fitzgerald and the Jazz Age:
(1) The Jazz Age: It refers to the 1920s, a time marked by frivolity, carelessness, hedonism and excitement in the life of the flaming youth. Fitzgerald is largely responsible for the term and many of his literary works portray it. The Jazz Age is brought vividly to life in The Great Gatsby. (2) Most critics have agreed that Fitzgerald is both an insider and an outsider of the Jazz Age with a double vision of fascination and aloofness. He lived in his great moments and joined the big party in the l920s, partaking of the wealth, frivolity, temptations of the time, while reproducing the drama of the age by standing aloof and keeping a cold eye on the performance of his contemporaries. He drank and did crazy things after he got drunk, whereas staying sober enough to see the corruptive nature of the society and the vanity fair that everyone, including himself, was infatuated with. This doubleness or irony is one of the distinguishing marks as a writer and helps Fitzgerald to present a panorama of the Jazz Age with a deep insight.
(3) Fitzgerald's fictional world is the best embodiment of the spirit of the Jazz Age, in which he shows a particular interest in the upper-class society, especially the upper-class young people. Young men and women in the 1920s had a sense of reckless confidence not only about money but about life in general. Since they grew up with the notion that the world would improve without their help, they felt excused from seeking the common good. Plunging into their personal adventures, engaging themselves in casual sex and heavy drinking, they took risks that did not impress them as being risks, and they spent money extravagantly and enjoyed themselves to their hearts' content. But beneath their masks of relaxation and joviality there was only sterility, meaninglessness and futility, and amid the grandeur and extravagance a spiritual wasteland and a hint of decadence and moral decay. This undeniable juxtaposition of appearance with reality, of the pretense of gaiety with the tension underneath, is easily recognizable in Fitzgerald's novels and stories.
F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940)
Jiang Wenquan
1. His Life and Writing:
Francis Scott Fitzgerald was a most representative figure of the 1920s, who was mirror of the exciting age in almost every way. An active participant of his age, he never failed to remain detached and foresee the failure and tragedy of the "Dollar Decade." Thus he is often acclaimed literary spokesman of the Jazz Age. F. Scott Fitzgerald was born in St. Paul, Minnesota on September 24, 1896. In his childhood, he admired his gentlemanly father who retained his upper-class manners but was always a little sensitive to the poor Irish beginnings on his mother's side. He had an expensive education in private schools at Princeton. But due to illness and neglect of academic study, he left the university in 1917 without graduation. He married Zelda Sayre, who exerted a strong influence on his literary career and his personal life. Zelda has been regarded as the prototype of a series of rich, beautiful women who figure so prominently in his fiction. The young couple frequently went abroad and lived extravagantly a luxurious life. To keep earning enough money, Fitzgerald wrote short stories and novels at a rapid speed. The 1930s brought relentless decline for Fitzgerald with a series of misfortunes: his reputation declined, his wealth fell, his health failed, and what's more, Zelda had suffered from some serious mental breakdowns which confined her in a sanitarium for the rest of her life. Alcoholism, loneliness and despair combined to ruin Fitzgerald. He died in 1940 of a heart attack.
2. His Major Works:
His novels and short stories chronicled uring the 1920s, a period dubbed “The Jazz Age”. His first novel This Side of Paradise人间天堂won for him wealth and fame. His second novel, The Beautiful and Damned美丽与诅咒increased his popularity, which also portrays the emotional and spiritual collapse of a wealthy young man during an unstable marriage. The couple in the novel were undoubtedly modeled after Fitzgerald himself and Zelda. His masterpiece The Great Gatsby了不起的盖茨比 (1925) made him one of the greatest American novelists. Afterwards, Fitzgerald wrote one more important novel Tender is the Night 夜色温柔(l934), in which he traces the decline of a young American psychiatrist whose marriage to a beautiful and wealthy patient drains his personal energies and corrodes his professional career. His last novel The Last Tycoon最后的大亨 remains unfinished. Fitzgerald also wrote short stories of great popularity. His short story collections include Flappers and Philosophers新潮女郎与哲学家(1921), Tales of the Jazz Age 爵士乐时代的故事(1922), All the Sad Young Man 形形色色忧郁的青年人(1926) and Taps at Reveille早晨的起床号 (1935). One of his best short stories is "Babylon Revisited重访巴比伦 ," which depicts an American's return to Paris in the 1930s and his regretful realization that the past is beyond his reach, since he can neither alter it nor make any amends.