F. Scott Fitzgerald is considered to be one of the most talented and significant American authors of the twentieth-century due to the fluid, descriptive style of his short stories and novels reflecting life in the 1920s and 1930s. His style encapsulated the themes of the time period through descriptive and detailed analogies. His short story, Bernice Bobs Her Hair, was written in the “Jazz Age” of the 1920s. In contrast, Babylon Revisited, was written in the 1930s in the midst of the Great Depression. Through his deliberate and descriptive writing style, F. Scott Fitzgerald differentiates the two stories by using contrasting characters, and central conflicts.
While there are not many similarities between Bernice Bobs Her Hair and Babylon Revisited,
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First, the majority of the characters in each story differs greatly. In Bernice Bobs Her Hair, Fitzgerald focuses mainly on youthful characters. These characters have simplistic and petty goals compared to those of Babylon Revisited. They make irresponsible, impulsive decisions, thinking it would not affect their futures. One example, Marjorie, focused on herself and what she wanted which was to have fun without regard to others. The main objective for the characters in Bernice Bobs Her Hair were trivial teenage goals. This ideal is exemplified when Marjorie talks to her mother about cheap popularity, “‘It’s everything when you’re eighteen’” (“Bernice”). This quote represented the ideal of most young people during that time period. However, in Babylon Revisited, the characters assume more serious and adult-like roles. The main character, Charlie, has to assume responsibility for his actions instead of being carefree like the characters in Bernice Bobs Her Hair. Charlie is desperate to regain the custody of his daughter, Honoria. Fitzgerald does an excellent job of characterizing this need through the quote, “‘I 'm awfully anxious to have Honoria in it. I appreciate your taking in Honoria for her mother 's sake, but things have changed now...’” (“Babyon”). The quote shows Charlie’s attempt to regain his daughter, while …show more content…
Scott Fitzgerald’s view of the 1920s. Traditional gender roles are both reinforced and challenged throughout the story mainly through Marjorie’s character. She was praised and became popular for her “masculine” traits of being “witty,” but she still had to maintain her position in the feminine realm with her appearance. This contradiction reflects the fact that men of that time period wanted to be stimulated, but not challenged in regards to finding a suitable partner. Fitzgerald also highlights the volatile and fickle mentality of youth in the 1920s throughout the story. However, more serious and adult themes such as: alcoholism, trying to escape the past, and taking responsibility for one 's actions is found in “Babylon Revisited.” Fitzgerald viewed the 1930s as a decade for those who acted too frivolously to finally experience the repercussions for their actions. As he aged, his stories grew darker, which reflected that his once carefree view had shifted to reflect the harsh realities of
F Scott Fitzgerald once wrote that “[m]ostly, we authors must repeat ourselves—that's the truth. We have two or three great moving experiences in our lives—experiences so great and moving that it doesn't seem at the time that anyone else has been so caught up and pounded and dazzled and astonished and beaten and broken and rescued and illuminated and rewarded and humbled in just that way ever before” (Fitzgerald, “One”). The idea that one experience so deeply affects an author that he or she will retell the story in different ways is seen in F Scott Fitzgerald book The Great Gatsby and the short story “Babylon Revisited”. The parallel between the two pieces of literature is clearly shown through many aspects. F Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great
Francis Scott Fitzgerald, also known under his writer’s name, F. Scott Fitzgerald, is revered as a famous American novelist for his writing masterpieces in the 1920’s and 1930’s. F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote about his extravagant lifestyle in America that his wife, Zelda, their friends, and him lived during that era. In fact, a lot of his novels and essays were based off of real-life situations with exaggerated plots and twists. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novels were the readers looking glass into his tragic life that resulted in sad endings in his books, and ultimately his own life. F. Scott Fitzgerald lived in a nice neighborhood, but growing up, he wasn’t privileged.
The great Gatsby gives us an accurate insight into the 1920s zeitgeist regarding the role of women in society. America was in a state of an economic boom and rapid change. Society had become less conservative after world war one. The role of women was revolutionary during this time and although women had a lot more freedom now; they were still confined to their sexist role within society; Men were still seen as the dominant gender. Scott Fitzgerald illustrates the extremities of gender and social class, and the lack of independence this brought upon women. This essay will discuss the three major female characters and the ideas that Fitzgerald confronts of female stereotypes of the 1920s.
Mizener, Arthur, ed. F. Scott Fitzgerald: A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1963.
Fitzgerald, F. Scott. “Babylon Revisited”. Short Fiction: Classic and Contemporary. 6th ed. Ed. Charles Bohner and Lyman Grant. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2006.
In "Babylon Revisited," Fitzgerald uses these troubled times as a background for his story. The main character is someone many Americans of the day could sympathize with. His rise from mediocrity to a life of wealth and leisure and then his tragic fall appealed to the broken and world-weary masses subjugated by the demoralizing affects of the depression.
The 1920s were a time of big dreams, moral decline, and hardships in America . The Roaring Twenties were a different time altogether with its bootleggers and speakeasies, women becoming more independent, the poor becoming poorer, but through all this was The American Dream keeping the hope afloat. F. Scott Fitzgerald captured this era in his book, The Great Gatsby. Through his many symbols he illustrates the hopes, the forgotten God, and the oppressed Americans of the Twenties. The symbols in The Great Gatsby help convey several different themes, from wealth to loss of morals, to poverty.
Fitzgerald's book at first overwhelms the reader with poetic descriptions of human feelings, of landscapes, buildings and colors. Everything seems to have a symbolic meaning, but it seems to be so strong that no one really tries to look what's happening behind those beautiful words. If you dig deeper you will discover that hidden beneath those near-lyrics are blatancies, at best.
In the novel The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald is criticizing American society of the 1920s. He uses the characters to demonstrate the power than men had over women during these times, as well as their mindless, self-indulgent actions, where consequence was only an afterthought. The attitude towards and the role of women is shown throughout the novel. Fitzgerald also shows how many people in America during this time were delusional and had meaningless existences.
In the past century in America, one of the decades that has stood out most as a time of change is the 1920s. In a post-war economic boom, the decade was a time of cultural and societal change. Among the parties and the more relaxed way of life, Americans experienced new wealth and luxury. Capturing the essence of the Roaring Twenties is a daunting task, especially because of the many different factors contributing to the decade’s fame. However, F. Scott Fitzgerald managed to capture and define the spirit of the 1920s through his novel.
Considered as the defining work of the 1920s, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald was published in 1925, when America was just coming out of one of the most violent wars in the nation’s history. World War 1 had taken the lives of many young people who fought and sacrificed for our country on another continent. The war left many families without fathers, sons, and husbands. The 1920s is an era filled with rich and dazzling history, where Americans experienced changes in lifestyle from music to rebellion against the United States government. Those that are born into that era grew up in a more carefree, extravagant environment that would affect their interactions with others as well as their attitudes about themselves and societal expectations. In this novel, symbols are used to represent the changing times and create a picture of this era for generations to come. The history, settings, characters, and symbols embedded in The Great Gatsby exemplify life in America during the 1920s.
Scott Fitzgerald. In his story titled Babylon Revisited, Fitzgerald epitomizes the genre. The story focuses on Charlie Wales, who is visiting Paris after a year and a half away. During Charlie’s time away, the stock market crash hit America, sending a shockwave through the economies of the world. Charlie’s old life in Paris was one of almost limitless money fueling a decadent lifestyle of alcohol, parties and promiscuity.
F. Scott Fitzgerald, having lived through the era of the “New Women” in the 1920’s, uses two female protagonists in both his novel Great Gatsby (e.g. Daisy Buchanan) and his short story “Bernice Bobs Her Hair” (e.g. Marjorie Harvey). As such, he personifies his desired theme to define the female presence shaped by shifts in society during the 1920’s. He uses an apathetic and cynical tone that paints each character in a negative light. In other words, American women were known as having unequal rights as compared to men; they were often entrapped in oppressive marriages and seen as the inferior sex. Women are portrayed as inferior to men through Fitzgerald’s writings of both the Great Gatsby and “Bernice Bobs Her Hair.”
F. Scott Fitzgerald was one of the most compelling twentieth century writers, (Curnutt, 2004). The year 1925 marks the year of the publication of Fitzgerald’s most credited novel, The Great Gatsby (Bruccoli, 1985). With its critiques of materialism, love and the American Dream (Berman, 1996), this dramatic idyllic novel, (Harvey, 1957), although poorly received at first, is now highly regarded as Fitzgerald’s finest work (Rohrkemper, 1985) and is his publisher, Scribner 's most popular title, (Donahue, 2013). The novel achieved it’s status as one of the most influential novels in American history around the nineteen fifties and sixties, over ten years after Fitzgerald 's passing, (Ibid, 1985)
In writing this book, commonly refered to as the “Great American Novel”, F. Scott Fitzgerald achieved in showing future generations what the early twenties were like, and the kinds of people that lived then. He did this in a beautifully written novel with in-depth characters, a captivating plot, and a wonderful sense of the time period.