F. Scott Fitzgerald

The debut of an American original. Here is the accomplished first novel that catapulted F. Scott Fitzgerald to literary fame-at the age of 23. It follows the education-intellectual, spiritual, and sexual-of young Amory Blaine.

Jay Gatsby is the man who has everything. But one thing will always be out of his reach! Everybody who is anybody is seen at his glittering parties. Day and night his Long Island mansion buzzes with bright young things drinking, dancing and debating his mysterious character. For Gatsby — young, handsome, fabulously rich — always seems alone in the crowd, watching and waiting, though no one knows what for. Beneath the shimmering surface of his life he is hiding a secret: a silent longing that can never be fulfilled. And soon this destructive obsession will force his world to unravel.

Edited and with an Introduction by Bryant Mangum Foreword by Roxana Robinson Benediction • Head and Shoulders • Bernice Bobs Her Hair • The Ice Palace • The Offshore Pirate • May Day • The Jelly Bean • The Diamond as Big as the Ritz • Winter Dreams • Absolution In the euphoric months before and after the publication of «This Side of Paradise», F. Scott Fitzgerald, the flapper’s historian and poet laureate of the Jazz Age, wrote the ten stories that appear in this unique collection. Exploring characters and themes that would appear in his later works, such as «The Beautiful and Damned» and «The Great Gatsby», these early selections are among the very best of Fitzgerald’s many short stories. This Modern Library Paperback Classic includes notes, an appendix of nonfiction essays by Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald and their contemporaries, and vintage magazine illustrations.

First published in 1920, Flappers and Philosophers marked F. Scott Fitzgerald's entry into the realm of the short story, in which he adroitly proved himself «a master of the mechanism of short story technique (Boston Transcript). Several of his most beloved tales are represented in this collection of eight, including Bernice Bobs Her Hair and Head and Shoulders, with their particularly O. Henry-like twists; the poignant Benediction and The Cut-Glass Bowl; and The Offshore Pirate, the octet's opening and most romantic story. It is a collection of masterful short works from an American literary icon that led The New York Times Book Review to note that [no one] can fail to recognize Mr. Fitzgerald's talent and genius. Pocket Books' Enriched Classics present the great works of world literature enhanced for the contemporary reader. Special features include critical perspectives, suggestions for further reading, and a unique visual essay composed of period photographs that help bring every word to life.

Caught up in his own cynicism and vulnerability, Monroe Stahr inhabits a world dominated by business, alcohol and promiscuity. This is Fitzgerald's last novel, left unfinished. It bids farewll to the American dream, with a hero who doesn't believe in morality and fails to see love.

»This Side of Paradise» is the book that established F. Scott Fitzgerald as the prophet and golden boy of the newly dawned Jazz Age. Published in 1920, when he was just twenty-three, the novel catapulted him to instant fame and financial success. The story of Amory Blaine, a privileged, aimless, and self-absorbed Princeton student, «This Side of Paradise» closely reflects Fitzgerald's own experiences as an undergraduate. Amory Blaine's journey from prep school to college to the First World War is an account of «the lost generation». The young «romantic egotist» symbolizes what Fitzgerald so memorably described as «a new generation grown up to find all Gods dead, all wars fought, all faiths in man shaken». A pastiche of literary styles, this dazzling chronicle of youth remains bitingly relevant decades later.

Amory Blaine, intent on rebelling against his staid, Midwestern upbringing, longs to acquire the patina of Eastern sophistication. In his quest for sexual and intellectual enlightenment, he progresses through a series of relationships, until he is cast out into the real world.

Jay Gatsby is the man who has everything. But one thing will always be out of his reach... Everybody who is anybody is seen at his glittering parties. Day and night his Long Island mansion buzzes with bright young things drinking, dancing and debating his mysterious character. For Gatsby — young, handsome, fabulously rich — always seems alone in the crowd, watching and waiting, though no one knows what for. Beneath the shimmering surface of his life he is hiding a secret: a silent longing that can never be fulfilled. And soon this destructive obsession will force his world to unravel.

In «Tender is the Night», Fitzgerald distilled much of his tempestuous life with his wife Zelda, and the knowledge of the wrecked, fabulous Fitzgeralds adds poignancy and regret to this tender, supple and poetic portrait. To the just-fashionable French Riviera come Dick and Nicole Diver — handsome, rich, glamorous and enormous fun. Their dinners are legend, their atmosphere magnetic, their intelligence fine. But something is wrong. Nicole has a secret and Dick a weakness. Together they head towards the rocks on which their lives crash — and only one of them really survives.

»The Diamond as Big as the Ritz» is an ominous fable about the pursuit of great wealth. Readers will be transported to a fabulous fantasy land of such opulence that its very existence has to remain a jealously guarded secret. Fatal consequences lie in store for 'bona fide' guests and uninvited visitors alike, while the sybaritic luxury of the place is evoked in an effortless prose style which is quintessentially F. Scott Fitzgerald. Also featured in this volume are «The Cut-Glass Bowl», «May Day», «The Rich Boy», «Crazy Sunday», «An Alcoholic Case», «The Lees of Happiness», «The Lost Decade» and «Babylon Revisited».

This book is with an introduction and notes by Henry Claridge, Senior Lecturer, School of English, University of Kent at Canterbury. «Tender is the Night» is a story set in the hedonistic high society of Europe during the «Roaring Twenties». A wealthy schizophrenic, Nicole Warren, falls in love with Dick Diver — her psychiatrist. The resulting saga of the Diver's troubled marriage and their circle of friends, includes a cast of aristocratic and beautiful people, unhappy love affairs, a duel, incest, and the problems inherent in the possession of great wealth. Despite cataloging a maelstrom of interpersonal conflict, «Tender is the Night» has a poignancy and warmth which springs from the quality of F Scott Fitzgerald's writing and the tragic personal experiences on which the book is based.

Generally considered to be F. Scott Fitzgerald's finest novel, The Great Gatsby is a consummate summary of the «roaring twenties», and a devastating expose of the «Jazz Age». Through the narration of Nick Carraway, the reader is taken into the superficially glittering world of the mansions which lined the Long Island shore in the 1920s, to encounter Nick's cousin Daisy, her brash but wealthy husband Tom Buchanan, Jay Gatsby and the mystery that surrounds him.

Young love, unbelievable wealth, greed, cruelty and adventure are the themes Fitzgerald brilliantly combines to create a highly unusual story with a surprise ending that no reader will be able to put down. In this story the great Fitzgerald reveals a bizarre segment of the rich and careless American society of the 1920s, which he often criticized and yet belonged to.