1. Background Notes for the quintessential American Novel
The Great Gatsby
Background Notes
for the quintessential
American Novel

2. F. Scott Fitzgerald Born 1896
Catholic ‘respectable’ family from St. Paul Minnesota
‘Shabby Genteel’ family:
-upper middle class traditions
-no real financial security

3. F. Scott Fitzgerald Private prep school education St. Paul Academy
Princeton University in 1913
1. Romance with flighty, wealthy Ginerva
King from Chicago (unattainable)
2. Dropped out sophomore year (‘illness’)
3. Returned for his junior year
4. Dropped out (for good) his senior year and took Army
commission of 2nd Lieutenant November 1917
note: WWI had begun in 1914, US entered 1917

4. F. Scott Fitzgerald and Zelda
F. Scott stationed in Alabama (not Europe)
Met 2nd love: Zelda Sayre
1. Courted in Alabama
2. Wealthy debutante, courted by many men
3. F. Scott wanted to marry immediately
4. Zelda refused until he could demonstrate financial
solvency to maintain her accustomed lifestyle
5. WWI ended in 1918, so Fitzgerald heads to NYC

5. Fitzgerald on a Mission in NYC
Decorates his apartment with rejection slips for eight months
Zelda claims love in her letters to him
Moves home with parents in St. Paul to write full-time
Began to publish and get rave
commercial and academic reviews
Returns to NYC

6. Fitzgerald Making Progress
Published This Side of Paradise 1921
Married Zelda one week after publication
Became ‘golden boy’ of the Roaring 20s

7. Being the Fitzgeralds Luxury apartment in NYC
Alcoholism both parties
suffered
Party lifestyle non-stop
Famous friends, outrageous
parties, unlimited funds
Spent all $ as they made it
Trips to Europe (Paris regularly) with friends

8. The Fitzgerald Marriage
Daughter, ‘Scottie’
Published The Beautiful and the Damned
Moved to Long Island

9. The Fitzgerald Marriage
Zelda writes a novel and paints
Family moves to Europe in 1924
-Zelda has affair with French aviator
-Drinking escalates
Fitzgerald writes The Great Gatsby
Publishes garbage to support lifestyle
Status surpassed by Hemingway & TS Eliot

10. The Saga Continues . . F. Scott publishes Tender is the Night in 1934
Zelda has three psychotic breaks
-obsesses over becoming a ballerina
-institutionalized (bipolar? schizophrenic?)
-Expensive need: permanent placement in institution
Writes for Hollywood
Has affair with Sheila Graham (London)

11. What Would Freud Say?

12. The Downward Spiral Writes The Last Tycoon No publications;
literary death
November & December
1940: two heart attacks
and death

13. And What of Zelda???? Outlived Fitzgerald at institution
Burned to death in a 1947 fire
while committed
In a cruel twist, Fitzgerald’s works were ‘rediscovered’ in the 1960s

14. On Fitzgerald’s gravestone:
“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”

15. A Historical Context for Gatsby
World War I ended in 1918
1. Isolationism starts
2. Shift from idealism to hedonism
-Trench warfare
-Dread of death
-Dead husbands, fathers, sons

16. Living for Today 4. Flappers 5. Jazz music 6. Mood of rebellion
3. Speakeasy parties (Prohibition)
4. Flappers
5. Jazz music
6. Mood of rebellion
7. Outrageous dancing

17. Women in the 1920s . . . more essential context
1882 Married Woman’s Property Act
th Amendment passes
Coco Chanel eliminates the corset

18. More historical context . . .
Amelia Earhart became famous aviator and made pants fashionable
for women
Birth control was considered
illegal and profane.
Margaret Sanger fought for
this right for all US women

19. And more context . . . Over 40% of US women worked,
contrary to popular misconceptions
Most worked in dangerous working
conditions for little pay

20. More ceiling shattering
Babe Didrickson Zaharius won many gold medals in the olympics
Madame CJ Walker began
the first African American
beauty supply company
and became a mogul

21. But still . . .
Women, overall, had little social, financial, or political power. Marrying for romantic love was a luxury most women did not have. Often, marriages were arranged by parents based on finance and status.