F. Scott Fitzgerald: The Great Gatsby

F. Scott Fitzgerald

Cambridge University Press, Aug 30, 1991 - Literary Criticism - 225 pages

Since its publication in 1925, The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald's account of the American dream gone awry, has established itself as one of the most popular and widely read novels in the English language. Until now, however, no edition has printed the novel exactly as Fitzgerald intended. The first edition was marred by errors resulting from Fitzgerald's extensive rewriting in proof and the conditions under which the book was produced; moreover, the subsequent transmission of the text introduced proliferating departures from the author's words. This critical edition draws on the manuscript and surviving proofs of the novel, together with Fitzgerald's subsequent revisions to key passages, to provide the first authoritative text of The Great Gatsby. This volume also includes a detailed account of the genesis, composition, and publication of the novel; a full textual apparatus; crucial early draft material; helpful glosses on the peculiar geography and chronology of the book; and explanatory notes on topical allusions and historical references that contemporary readers might otherwise miss. Fitzgerald's masterpiece is thus brought closer to a cross-section of readers, more accessibly and more authentically than ever before. Matthew J. Bruccoli has published widely. He is the author of Some Sort of Epic Grandeur: The Life of F. Scott Fitzgerald (1980) and editor of New Essays on The Great Gatsby (CUP, 1985).

Contents

• Acknowledgments page: vii
• Early draft of the GatsbyTom: xvi
• Reception and reputation: xx
• The revised galleys: xxxiv
• THE GREAT GATSBY: 1
• Substantive emendations and textual notes: 143
• Late Fitzgerald corrections and revisions: 175
• Note on Absolution 105: 205
• Fitzgeralds introduction to the Modern: 222

About the author

F(rancis) Scott Fitzgerald was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, on September 24, 1896. He was educated at Princeton University and served in the U.S. Army from 1917 to 1919, attaining the rank of second lieutenant. In 1920 Fitzgerald married Zelda Sayre, a young woman of the upper class, and they had a daughter, Frances. Fitzgerald is regarded as one of the finest American writers of the 20th Century. His most notable work was the novel, The Great Gatsby (1925). The novel focused on the themes of the Roaring Twenties and of the loss of innocence and ethics among the nouveau riche. He also made many contributions to American literature in the form of short stories, plays, poetry, music, and letters. Ernest Hemingway, who was greatly influenced by Fitzgerald's short stories, wrote that Fitzgerald's talent was "as fine as the dust on a butterfly's wing." Yet during his lifetime Fitzgerald never had a best-selling novel and, toward the end of his life, he worked sporadically as a screenwriter at motion picture studios in Los Angeles. There he contributed to scripts for such popular films as Winter Carnival and Gone with the Wind. Fitzgerald's work is inseparable from the Roaring 20s. Berenice Bobs Her Hair and A Diamond As Big As The Ritz, are two short stories included in his collections, Tales of the Jazz Age and Flappers and Philosophers. His first novel The Beautiful and Damned was flawed but set up Fitzgerald's major themes of the fleeting nature of youthfulness and innocence, unattainable love, and middle-class aspiration for wealth and respectability, derived from his own courtship of Zelda. This Side of Paradise (1920) was Fitzgerald's first unqualified success. Tender Is the Night, a mature look at the excesses of the exuberant 20s, was published in 1934. Much of Fitzgerald's work has been adapted for film, including Tender is the Night , The Great Gatsby, and Babylon Revisited which was adapted as The Last Time I Saw Paris by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1954. The Last Tycoon, adapted by Paramount in 1976, was a work in progress when Fitzgerald died of a heart attack on December 21, 1940, in Hollywood, California. Fitzgerald is buried in St. Mary's Cemetery in Rockville, Maryland.

Matthew J. Bruccoli, Emily Brown Jefferies Professor of English at the University of South Carolina, is the leading authority on F. Scott Fitzgerald and the authors of the House of Scribner.

Bibliographic information

• Title: F. Scott Fitzgerald: The Great Gatsby; Volume 1 of Fitzgerald, Francis S.: [ The Cambridge edition of the works]; Scribner Paperback Fiction; The Cambridge Edition of the Works of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald; Volume 1 of The Cambridge edition of the works; Works (1991), Francis Scott Fitzgerald; Works, Francis Scott Fitzgerald
• Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
• Editor: Matthew J. Bruccoli
• Contributor: Matthew J. Bruccoli
• Edition: illustrated, reprint
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 1991
• ISBN: 0521402301, 9780521402309
• Length: 225 pages
• Subjects: Fiction / Classics; Literary Criticism / American / General; Literary Criticism / General