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Flappers and Philosophers

Flappers and Philosophers is a collection of eight short stories by American writer F. Scott Fitzgerald, published in 1920 by Charles Scribner's Sons. Each of the stories had originally appeared, independently, in either The Saturday Evening Post, Scribner's Magazine, or The Smart Set.[1][2]

Flappers and Philosophers
The cover of the 1920 first edition
AuthorF. Scott Fitzgerald
Cover artistW. E. Hill
LanguageEnglish
GenreShort stories
Publication placeUnited States
Media typePrint (hardcover & paperback)
ISBN978-1406509564

The volume includes "The Ice Palace," regarded as one of Fitzgerald's finest short works.[3]

Stories

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The original periodical publication and date are indicated.[4][5]

Background

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The stories published in Nassau Literary Review while Fitzgerald was attending Princeton University, as well as those that comprise Flappers and Philosophers, may be placed among his "apprenticeship fiction."[7][8]

In November 1919, Fitzgerald engaged Harold Ober as his literary agent. By early 1920, Ober had negotiated the sale of six of Fitzgerald's stories to The Saturday Evening Post, one of several "high-paying mass-circulation slick-paper magazines." Fitzgerald was paid $400 for each story.[9][10] Fitzgerald's short fiction became identified with the Post in the following years, to whom he would sell sixty-five of his stories—"40 percent of his output."[9]

Literary critic and biographer Matthew J. Bruccoli notes that "during his lifetime, Fitzgerald was far better known and more widely read as a short story writer than as a novelist."[9]

Reception

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F. Scott Fitzgerald

The New York Times in its September 26, 1920 edition evaluated the collection in light of Fitzgerald's recently published first novel This Side of Paradise (1920): "[H]is eight short stories range the gamut of style and mood with a brilliance, a jeu perle ["pearly tone"], so to speak, which is not to be found in the novel."[11] The reviewer compares the works favorably to the "Russian school" and to the American author O. Henry, and closes by commending "Mr. Fitzgerald's talent and genius."[11]

Themes

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Literary critic and biographer John Kuehl reports that the book reflects the social types identified in the collection's title:

Diverse characters and classes manifest themselves, yet Fitzgerald's fundamentally bourgeois world features the ubiquitous homme manqué and the femme fatale, for courtship and marriage comprise the all-important sexual element.[12]

References

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Citations

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  1. ^ Bryer 2000, p. 1069.
  2. ^ Eble 1963, p. 54: The collection was published on September 10, 1920
  3. ^ Eble 1963, p. 56: "...as good a story as Fitzgerald ever wrote...clearly his best" of the stories in the collection.
  4. ^ Kuehl 1991, p. 184, Selected Bibliography.
  5. ^ Bryer 2000, p. 1069, Notes on the Texts.
  6. ^ Bruccoli 1998, p. 89: Bruccoli reports the date as May 29, 1920 in epigraph.
  7. ^ Kuehl 1991, p. 25: The stories, written between 1915 and 1921 "...like the author's prep-school efforts, may be said to comprise his apprenticeship fiction."
  8. ^ Bryer 2000, pp. 1059–1060, Chronology.
  9. ^ a b c Bruccoli 1998, p. 15.
  10. ^ Bryer 2000, p. 1061: Chronology: Fitzgerald paid "$400 for each of them."
  11. ^ a b The New York Times 1920.
  12. ^ Kuehl 1991, pp. 26, 32: "...a book focused on its two title-figure types..."

Sources

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