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The Disenchanted
A portrait of an age of both dazzling spirit and bitter disillusionment, based on the last drunken days of F. Scott Fitzgerald. The 1920 a golden age, and Manley Halliday is a golden figure. Lauded by the critics, this great writer of the decade has everything - beauty, brilliance, wealth, and a strikingly lovely wife. But years later, in the very different atmosphere of the thirties, Halliday is a shadow of his former self, cast up on the inhospitable shores of Hollywood. When Shep, a young and ambitious Hollywood screenwriter, is partnered up with Halliday, he is awestruck to find himself working alongside a literary hero. Enlisted by movie mogul Victor Milgrim to co-write college musical Love on Ice, the pair embark on a journey to New York. But Shep may find that his vision of the great Manley Halliday fails to match up with the man himself ...
322 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1950
38 people are currently reading
1569 people want to read
About the author
Budd Schulberg
97 books102 followersBudd Schulberg (1914–2009) was a screenwriter, novelist, and journalist who is best remembered for the classic novels What Makes Sammy Run?, The Harder They Fall, and the story On the Waterfront, which he adapted as a novel, play, and an Academy Award–winning film script. Born in New York City, Schulberg grew up in Hollywood, where his father, B. P. Schulberg, was head of production at Paramount, among other studios. Throughout his career, Schulberg worked as a journalist and essayist, often writing about boxing, a lifelong passion. Many of his writings on the sport are collected in Sparring with Hemingway (1995). Other highlights from Schulberg’s nonfiction career include Moving Pictures (1981), an account of his upbringing in Hollywood, and Writers in America (1973), a glimpse of some of the famous novelists he met early in his career. He died in 2009.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 74 reviews
November 2, 2016
This is a book that deserves to be called a classic. Hunt it out if you´ve never heard of it; if you have any interest in drunken writers, the history and workings of Hollywood, the reality of being a writer, the hangover of success, hangovers in generally, or simply working with someone who is impossible to work with.
Essentially the story of two men, fictionalised versions of the author, Schulberg, and F. Scott Fitzgerald, it describes the experience of a young novice writer who is ordered to work with an old, experienced author touched by genius but now well past his sell by date and in the throes of full-on alcoholism. Their project: a Hollywood movie called Love on Ice.
The novel works on many levels: as a critique of Hollywood at the time it is informed by Schulberg´s own personal circumstances. He was the son of a studio boss and writer of the screenplay of On The Waterfront. And he did really work with Scott Fitgerald, who emerges from the book as a sorry, sodden figure, once glittering at the centre of a brilliant world, now thrown up on some distant shore, alone, hungover, stuck with the memories of that time and unable to overcome himself and drag himself back there. Dirty suit, dirty thoughts, occasional flashes of the old genius and a desire to drink, drink, drink!
Essentially an experience in suffering - we are Shep, trying to get anything down on paper for a film everyone knows is going to be awful - the book is brilliantly written. Schulberg is a fearless writer - something which, in other books, he sometimes overdoes, in my opinion - but here his eye and pen combine to produce a real, living, awful, moving, teeth-clenchingly good novel.
Essentially the story of two men, fictionalised versions of the author, Schulberg, and F. Scott Fitzgerald, it describes the experience of a young novice writer who is ordered to work with an old, experienced author touched by genius but now well past his sell by date and in the throes of full-on alcoholism. Their project: a Hollywood movie called Love on Ice.
The novel works on many levels: as a critique of Hollywood at the time it is informed by Schulberg´s own personal circumstances. He was the son of a studio boss and writer of the screenplay of On The Waterfront. And he did really work with Scott Fitgerald, who emerges from the book as a sorry, sodden figure, once glittering at the centre of a brilliant world, now thrown up on some distant shore, alone, hungover, stuck with the memories of that time and unable to overcome himself and drag himself back there. Dirty suit, dirty thoughts, occasional flashes of the old genius and a desire to drink, drink, drink!
Essentially an experience in suffering - we are Shep, trying to get anything down on paper for a film everyone knows is going to be awful - the book is brilliantly written. Schulberg is a fearless writer - something which, in other books, he sometimes overdoes, in my opinion - but here his eye and pen combine to produce a real, living, awful, moving, teeth-clenchingly good novel.
January 31, 2013
This is an astonishingly good novel from the scriptwriter Budd Schulberg (he wrote 'A Face In The Crowd' (1957) one of the few films in which the hero starts off with our sympathy and ends with our loathing him). 'The Disenchanted' is about a Scott Fitzgerald-like writer, a once famous author who finds himself co-writing a bit of mediocre Hollywood froth with a young scriptwriter who happens to be an admirer of the writer's best work. Not realising that his idol is an alcoholic, the young screenwriter plies him with champagne on the plane, thus setting him off on a tragi-comic binge. The dialogue is beautifully funny, the style, seamless. I can't recommend this underrated novel enough.
July 3, 2024
Budd Schulberg could certainly write - and write well - esp. when it came to incisive character studies focused on (sometimes deeply) flawed (and often ambitious) men. He proved his ability most significantly in 'What Makes Sammy Run?' (recommended), 'The Harder They Fall' and the screenplays for 'A Face in the Crowd' and 'On the Waterfront' (for which he won an Oscar).
Published in 1950 and popular in its day (the 10th bestselling novel that year), 'The Disenchanted' is a work I've known about for years. But those of us who read voraciously will know how it is: there are simply too many books screaming (or quietly pleading) for attention and some of them get pushed to the side, sometimes staying there for decades - until they're again brought to mind.
When I finally started the read, it moved along smoothly enough. Schulberg has a seemingly effortless and engaging style. But then it dawned on me how I generally felt about the subject at hand: F. Scott Fitzgerald.
The novel is based on Schulberg's experience of working with Fitzgerald on an apparently frivolous 1939 film called 'Winter Carnival' (which I haven't seen). It seems the project was doomed from the start (completed by two other writers) due to Fitzgerald's alcoholism.
Full disclosure: I was never a Fitzgerald fan. His brand of romanticism eluded me.
Schulberg covers the entirety of the writing partnership (young man getting his first 'break', paired with a prestigious pro) to the point of almost agonizing detail. If the book ultimately begins to feel endless - and it does - it's because the descent into complete dissipation has fresh, continuous consequences at its lowering levels... and because witnessing someone drink himself to death (whether intentionally or not) is boring. There are countless scenes of the Schulberg alter ego attempting to get 'Manley Halliday' to apply himself - to get *something* done, no matter how little. It's a losing battle.
Full witness to the addiction becomes not only sad but infuriating. And, of course, Halliday's health plummets.
The only reason I read the whole book was out of a reader / viewer's allegiance to Schulberg. To his credit, he really does rise to the occasion of getting underneath the skin of the famous author who shot himself in the foot career-wise - largely due to his undying devotion to 'Jere' (the Zelda Fitzgerald stand-in). Schulberg gives most of the specifics of the relationship equal time. Still, a few sharp observations serve as sufficient diagnosis:
There are a few other powerful scenes as well - i.e., when Manley and Jere meet up again a number of years after their divorce: it's pathetic but instructive.
This is said to be Schulberg's 'masterpiece'. On some level, it's admirable. But it's understandable if this is not the work that comes readily to mind when people think of Schulberg.
Published in 1950 and popular in its day (the 10th bestselling novel that year), 'The Disenchanted' is a work I've known about for years. But those of us who read voraciously will know how it is: there are simply too many books screaming (or quietly pleading) for attention and some of them get pushed to the side, sometimes staying there for decades - until they're again brought to mind.
When I finally started the read, it moved along smoothly enough. Schulberg has a seemingly effortless and engaging style. But then it dawned on me how I generally felt about the subject at hand: F. Scott Fitzgerald.
The novel is based on Schulberg's experience of working with Fitzgerald on an apparently frivolous 1939 film called 'Winter Carnival' (which I haven't seen). It seems the project was doomed from the start (completed by two other writers) due to Fitzgerald's alcoholism.
Full disclosure: I was never a Fitzgerald fan. His brand of romanticism eluded me.
Schulberg covers the entirety of the writing partnership (young man getting his first 'break', paired with a prestigious pro) to the point of almost agonizing detail. If the book ultimately begins to feel endless - and it does - it's because the descent into complete dissipation has fresh, continuous consequences at its lowering levels... and because witnessing someone drink himself to death (whether intentionally or not) is boring. There are countless scenes of the Schulberg alter ego attempting to get 'Manley Halliday' to apply himself - to get *something* done, no matter how little. It's a losing battle.
Full witness to the addiction becomes not only sad but infuriating. And, of course, Halliday's health plummets.
The only reason I read the whole book was out of a reader / viewer's allegiance to Schulberg. To his credit, he really does rise to the occasion of getting underneath the skin of the famous author who shot himself in the foot career-wise - largely due to his undying devotion to 'Jere' (the Zelda Fitzgerald stand-in). Schulberg gives most of the specifics of the relationship equal time. Still, a few sharp observations serve as sufficient diagnosis:
People would turn to smile in appreciation when they entered rooms. Manley and Jere saw in their eyes the flattering reflection. They were a kind of double Narcissus.The book doesn't always lean toward dreariness. Occasionally there's a narrative reprieve - for example, when Halliday happens into the life of Ann, a film editor who is refreshingly mature. In her company he briefly grows up.
Thirty had seemed so old. The trouble with both of them, he was able to see with such brilliant hindsight now, was they had thought youth was a career instead of a preparation.
There are a few other powerful scenes as well - i.e., when Manley and Jere meet up again a number of years after their divorce: it's pathetic but instructive.
This is said to be Schulberg's 'masterpiece'. On some level, it's admirable. But it's understandable if this is not the work that comes readily to mind when people think of Schulberg.
March 29, 2019
Exceptionally good. Not perfect, of course, and rather loose and shaggy at times, but a real joy to read. Burgess has it on his list of 99 best Novels.
September 18, 2012
An excerpt from page 54:
"It must have been a fascinating period alright," Shep was saying. "I wish to hell I had seen it. But from the point of view of economic morality, it was bankrupt as hell, wasn't it? All that crazy speculation, people buying stuff they didn't need, with money they didn't have. And all the fat cats repeating 'Business is fundamentally sound.' That's what fell on us like a ton of bricks --and we're still trying to dig ourselves out from under."
I don't remember how this book found its way onto my to-read list. It pre-dates my time on goodreads, back when I only kept a little notebook to jot down interesting titles. It languished on my virtual shelf for so long. Shame. It's fucking amazing.
"It must have been a fascinating period alright," Shep was saying. "I wish to hell I had seen it. But from the point of view of economic morality, it was bankrupt as hell, wasn't it? All that crazy speculation, people buying stuff they didn't need, with money they didn't have. And all the fat cats repeating 'Business is fundamentally sound.' That's what fell on us like a ton of bricks --and we're still trying to dig ourselves out from under."
I don't remember how this book found its way onto my to-read list. It pre-dates my time on goodreads, back when I only kept a little notebook to jot down interesting titles. It languished on my virtual shelf for so long. Shame. It's fucking amazing.
October 20, 2007
This is a wistful fictionalized account of the author's real life encounter with F. Scott Fitzgerald. As the book begins, alcohol has depleted the Fitzgerald character's talent, and he has lost his will to really produce good work. This is a cautionary tale: Guard the talent you have; don't compromise it for anything.
February 15, 2013
This extraordinary book may well be the great American novel that not enough people know. It’s a masterpiece of American literature, and maybe, with a few other titles like The Last Tycoon, the best novel ever written about Hollywood. Funny, brilliant, devastating, exhilarating, and, ultimately, intensely cruel in a realistic and sad way, The Disenchanted is also wonderfully written, with bravura and style. It is the portrait of a former genius writer who, after having lost his golden touch, his celebrity status, his money, his wife, and his former glory, tries desperately, and vainly, to salvage his reputation and to re-conquer some kind of professional luster by working as a screenwriter for Hollywood. But, defeated by self-destruction, alcohol, nostalgia, and, most of all, by a Hollywood machine that is as infuriating and debilitating in the thirties as it is now (despite whatever love we may feel for the movies of the Golden Age), his road to recovery is a complete disaster. The whole story is seen through the eyes of an admirer and disciple who witnesses, powerless, the demise of his idol – and lets us watch it too. What makes this magnificent book about failure, and the other side of the American dream, acutely real is that it is inspired by the fate of Scott Fitzgerald, and by the experience that Schulberg had working with him. It is infinitely sad. But never has the implacable world of Hollywood been described so powerfully, and rarely have the torments and fall of a writer been portrayed with such psychological depth and intensity.
October 7, 2023
After reading "What Makes Sammy Run?" I thought there may be a potential for brilliance in the novels of Budd Schulberg. It was not to be found in that work, which was impressive for a debut but a bit shallow. I found the greatness, however, in "The Disenchanted" -- quite a difficult book for me to read as an alcoholic or former alcoholic or whatever I'm supposed to call myself. Not exactly a pleasant read but definitely worthwhile, something I won't forget anytime soon.
January 8, 2018
The protagonist, novice screenwriter Shep, both idolises and loathes his literary idol, Manley Halliday, and his ambivalence gives the story its terrific emotional tension. Now I want to reread "What Makes Sammy Run?" and "The Great Gatsby", two of my favourite novels.
July 27, 2013
Praise to Allison and Busby for reprinting this neglected classic in Britain.
Budd Schulberg achieved fame for writing On the Waterfront. As a young man, he idolised F. Scott Fitzgerald. Imagine how he felt when, as a young writer in Hollywood in the 1930s, he was partnered with his hero to work on film scripts.
But there were problems. Some were generational (30s blue collar radicalism vs 20s hedonism). Some, the most profound, were personal: Schulberg learned the hard way that meeting your hero - especially when he's become a gonzo alcoholic and 'spiritually OD' - isn't always best. He found that he was entranced even as he was repelled. That ambivalence forms the core of this novel, and breathes life into its pages.
A record of disenchantment, it does not despise wonder, and it is fair. 'Strange', the main character muses, 'how the decade that had made a virtue of irresponsibility produced more responsible artists than any American decade before or since.' It gives Fitzgerald's stand-in his due, saving him all the best lines: ('Readers want a sharp edge but they don't want to hear the grinding of an axe.')
You read it not just for what it says about fame, integrity and survival - though it is instructive on all three counts - but because it as moving and as true as any biography.
Budd Schulberg achieved fame for writing On the Waterfront. As a young man, he idolised F. Scott Fitzgerald. Imagine how he felt when, as a young writer in Hollywood in the 1930s, he was partnered with his hero to work on film scripts.
But there were problems. Some were generational (30s blue collar radicalism vs 20s hedonism). Some, the most profound, were personal: Schulberg learned the hard way that meeting your hero - especially when he's become a gonzo alcoholic and 'spiritually OD' - isn't always best. He found that he was entranced even as he was repelled. That ambivalence forms the core of this novel, and breathes life into its pages.
A record of disenchantment, it does not despise wonder, and it is fair. 'Strange', the main character muses, 'how the decade that had made a virtue of irresponsibility produced more responsible artists than any American decade before or since.' It gives Fitzgerald's stand-in his due, saving him all the best lines: ('Readers want a sharp edge but they don't want to hear the grinding of an axe.')
You read it not just for what it says about fame, integrity and survival - though it is instructive on all three counts - but because it as moving and as true as any biography.
June 1, 2023
This is probably the best novel written about F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald. It is also probably the best at depicting Hollywood in all its banality (along with Anita Loose’s novels!) and in comparing the culture of the 1920’s with that of the 30’s. The writing is astoundingly good, the characters deeply drawn and sympathetic (emphasis on pathetic!) and much of it reads like a screwball comedy despite the deeply serious subject matter. Schulberg successfully switches styles to mimic the romanticism of Fitzgerald’s 20’s writing, the super-realism of 30’s writers like Steinbeck, and he even perfects experimental Joyce-like stream of consciousness at the end of the book (which is a heartbreaking tour de force). So why is this book not an American classic? I’m not sure, but boy it should be! The Disenchanted is the best thing I’ve read in a couple of years and it’s definitely going on my favorites list!
January 13, 2015
Schulberg conobbe Scott Fitzgerald e ci lavorò insieme ad una sceneggiatura. Poi, ci scrisse un libro. Questa è la storia degli ultimi anni di vita di F.S.Fitzgerald. Scrittore molto amato e dalla vita alcolica e complicata. Ambientato a Hollywood ma non solo, "I Disincantati" racconta la storia di un incontro e nel frattempo gli anni 20 in America: il lusso, il successo, il declino. Bel libro, grandi dialoghi, personaggi convincenti. Mi ero dimenticata dell'età del jazz....
May 23, 2012
This is not only a brilliant semi-biographical novel about F. Scott Fitzgerald but it's also one of the best novels ever written about Hollywood.
July 19, 2025
Perhaps one of the best books I'll ever read. Comes to mind the Writer's monologue in Tarkovsky's STALKER (1979): "[...] What good can your knowledge do? Who is going to get a guilty conscience because of it? Me? I have no conscience. I just got nerves. Some bastards would criticize me, I get wounded. Another would laud me, I get wounded again. I would put my heart and soul into it, they gobble up both my heart and soul. I would relieve my soul of filth, they gobble it up too. They are all so literate. They all got sensory deficiency, and they are all swarming around, journalists, editors, critics, some endless broads, and they all demand: More! More! What hell of a writer am I if I hate writing? If it is constant torment for me, a painful, shameful occupation, sort of squeezing out a hemorrhoid? I used to think that someone would get better because of my books. No, nobody needs me! In two days after I die, they will start gobbling up someone else. I wanted to change them, but it is they who have changed me. Making me in their own image. The future used to be just a continuation of the present, with all the changes looming far behind the horizon. Now the future and the present are one. Are they ready for it?! They don't want to know anything! All they know is how to gobble!"
My quotes from the book:
"Was there any tragedy greater than a writer's outliving his gift, petering out like so many he had known?" (Chapter 4).
M. Halliday: "But the trouble is, a book is something that starts inside of you. You work from the inside out. You don't have to sit down and mechanically invent characters and situations. They're all there, ready to be released. A movie is just the opposite. It doesn't start inside anybody. Where was 'Love and Ice' conceived, for instance? Certainly not inside Shep Stearns, though I'm sure you could write your own college story. Not even inside Victor Milgrim. It's an orphan child born of artificial insemination on a box-office counter" (Chapter 10).
"Fame, romance, success — these things were so precious that no one could be entrusted with their possession for more than a moment" (Old Business II).
A. Loeb: "An athlete's career is just the opposite of an artist's. The athlete matures faster, loses his reflexes through his twenties and is washed up in his thirties. But an artist should build slowly through his twenties, start maturing in his thirties and reach his peak in his fifties or sixties. Maybe that's the trouble with you American writers, you think of yourselves as athletic stars" (Olds Business V).
H. Osborne: "A tremendous talent... You don't lose that. You just lose the way of putting it to work" (Chapter 18).
H. Osborne: "Being a failure — if it doesn't ruin you — can teach you something. Trouble with [Manley Halliday] was he had his youth and he had his success and he thought the two were the same thing and that both could last forever" (same).
"What had Manley Halliday said, the process of growing up is that of continual disenchantment, of continually shedding the old enchantment for the new?" (Chapter 21).
My quotes from the book:
"Was there any tragedy greater than a writer's outliving his gift, petering out like so many he had known?" (Chapter 4).
M. Halliday: "But the trouble is, a book is something that starts inside of you. You work from the inside out. You don't have to sit down and mechanically invent characters and situations. They're all there, ready to be released. A movie is just the opposite. It doesn't start inside anybody. Where was 'Love and Ice' conceived, for instance? Certainly not inside Shep Stearns, though I'm sure you could write your own college story. Not even inside Victor Milgrim. It's an orphan child born of artificial insemination on a box-office counter" (Chapter 10).
"Fame, romance, success — these things were so precious that no one could be entrusted with their possession for more than a moment" (Old Business II).
A. Loeb: "An athlete's career is just the opposite of an artist's. The athlete matures faster, loses his reflexes through his twenties and is washed up in his thirties. But an artist should build slowly through his twenties, start maturing in his thirties and reach his peak in his fifties or sixties. Maybe that's the trouble with you American writers, you think of yourselves as athletic stars" (Olds Business V).
H. Osborne: "A tremendous talent... You don't lose that. You just lose the way of putting it to work" (Chapter 18).
H. Osborne: "Being a failure — if it doesn't ruin you — can teach you something. Trouble with [Manley Halliday] was he had his youth and he had his success and he thought the two were the same thing and that both could last forever" (same).
"What had Manley Halliday said, the process of growing up is that of continual disenchantment, of continually shedding the old enchantment for the new?" (Chapter 21).
November 9, 2018
A young screen writer in Hollywood is tasked to work on a screenplay with a former literary giant he has long idolized. The giant is on the decline as he is wracked with alcoholism and lives in the world of his past. It shows the ravages of alcoholism. Every time he tries to pull himself together, he falls deeper and deeper into failure. The book is based on Schulberg's own experiences with F. Scott Fitzgerald, so it is very thinly disguised non-fiction. I have long admired Schulberg's novels, especially What Makes Sammy Run, but this was at the pinnacle.
November 5, 2023
The book has good writing and gave an interesting perspective into the 1920s and ‘30s. I’m giving this 3 stars because the there were some sections that felt too drawn out, but overall a good read with strong imagery, creative writing, and memorable characters.
August 8, 2011
If you're a Scott Fitzgerald fan, here's the story of a young screenwriter (Schulberg, the viewpoint character) who is paired with the author of Gatsby to go on a trip to Dartmouth to write a trivial picture called Love On Ice. This book has two very strong things going for it: 1) Schulberg spent weeks w/Fitzgerald, and has drawn him dramatically and accurately, in his last days, trying to stay on the wagon. 2) Schulberg grew up in the film colony (his dad ran Paramount) and has limned it with a wonderful, ironic objectivity.
This book taught me the fundamentals of story-telling; I can't recommend it highly enough.
This book taught me the fundamentals of story-telling; I can't recommend it highly enough.
July 21, 2012
This is the fourth book I've read by Budd Schulberg this year - he's become my new favourite author. This novel is based on his own experiences as a young screenwriter in Hollywood collaborating with F.Scott Fitzgerald, who's fictionalised here as "Manley Halliday". It's a superb portrait of a great writer on his uppers, tragic and comic by turns, and Schulberg wrings a surprising amount of suspense from the question of whether the two writers will actually get round to writing a script as his alter ego ("Shep Stearns") finds himself in a constant battle to keep Fitzgerald / Halliday off the booze.
July 29, 2008
For a book that basically takes place over the course of a week this seemed really long. It should have been about 150 pages shorter. But based on his screenplay for A Face In the Crowd I'd check out anything Schulberg has done.
June 16, 2014
I'm sure I was supposed to like this book - it was literary and an important study in character. But I found it a little dull. And I found the character kind of annoying. I kept wishing for the book to be over and that's never a good sign.
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April 6, 2016Depressing, but interestingly so. I'll never be able to think of F. Scott Fitzgerald in a glamorous light again.
September 25, 2023
Set in the golden age of Hollywood of the 1920s, the reader is introduced to Manley Halliday who happens to be a golden figure himself. He is lauded by the critics and happens to be the great writer of the decade with everything that includes beauty, brilliance, wealth and a spectacularly lovely wife. Years later, Manley Halliday finds himself in a very different atmosphere with it being the thirties, Halliday has become a shadow of who he used to be and has been cast up on the inhospitable shores of Hollywood.
We are then introduced to a character named Shep, who is a young and ambitious new screenwriter in Hollywood who finds himself being partnered up with Halliday. Shep is awestruck to be finding himself working alongside his literary hero, he is enlisted by the big movie mogul Victor Milgrim to co-write a college-based musical called Love on Ice. Both of the main characters embark on a journey to New York. Then Shep quickly discovers that his vision of his hero/co-writer fails to match up with the man himself.
This is the first novel by Budd Schulberg (1914 - 2009) that I have read and I really liked reading this novel and hope to read more of his work. To give a few positives about the novel, It gives the reader a sense of the setting which happens to be the late 1920s/early 1930s with its moment of being over the top (just like Babylon) and the main storyline of the novel which is about a writer working with their role models but turns out you should never meet your role models because of who their turn out to be. If the novel has a weakness, for me I wish we had a little bit of history of that time added into the novel aswell.
We are then introduced to a character named Shep, who is a young and ambitious new screenwriter in Hollywood who finds himself being partnered up with Halliday. Shep is awestruck to be finding himself working alongside his literary hero, he is enlisted by the big movie mogul Victor Milgrim to co-write a college-based musical called Love on Ice. Both of the main characters embark on a journey to New York. Then Shep quickly discovers that his vision of his hero/co-writer fails to match up with the man himself.
This is the first novel by Budd Schulberg (1914 - 2009) that I have read and I really liked reading this novel and hope to read more of his work. To give a few positives about the novel, It gives the reader a sense of the setting which happens to be the late 1920s/early 1930s with its moment of being over the top (just like Babylon) and the main storyline of the novel which is about a writer working with their role models but turns out you should never meet your role models because of who their turn out to be. If the novel has a weakness, for me I wish we had a little bit of history of that time added into the novel aswell.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 18, 2025
Schulberg, the son of a successful Hollywood producer, is probably best known for his screenplays (On the Waterfront, A Face in the Crowd), but he started as a novelist with What Makes Sammy Run?, about a Hollywood publicist.
This book follows about ten years later, and is the thinly fictionalized story of an ill-fated trip Schulberg made with F. Scott Fitzgerald, to Dartmouth. Fitzgerald was nearing the end of his life and was trying to scrape together cash by working on screenplays for Hollywood. Schulberg had been assigned to him as a collaborator/babysitter to make the trip to gather source material for the script for musical featuring a collegiate winter carnival. But although Fitzgerald had been sober a good part of a year before this trip, the pressure and uncertainty he felt about it caused him to fall off the wagon with disastrous results.
I only found out that this was pretty much a true story after I had read it and was looking up the author for a bit of info on his background. It was obviously written by an insider with knowledge of the entire process, and is equally a madcap adventure and horribly sad, as the young companion, Shep (Schulberg’s persona), goes from hero worship to impatience, to pity. Old school Factory Hollywood was not only brutal to the actors, but the rest of the machinery as well, and fame was no shield for anyone.
A compelling read, and no wonder he did so well in screenplays. The dialogue was absolutely on point.
This book follows about ten years later, and is the thinly fictionalized story of an ill-fated trip Schulberg made with F. Scott Fitzgerald, to Dartmouth. Fitzgerald was nearing the end of his life and was trying to scrape together cash by working on screenplays for Hollywood. Schulberg had been assigned to him as a collaborator/babysitter to make the trip to gather source material for the script for musical featuring a collegiate winter carnival. But although Fitzgerald had been sober a good part of a year before this trip, the pressure and uncertainty he felt about it caused him to fall off the wagon with disastrous results.
I only found out that this was pretty much a true story after I had read it and was looking up the author for a bit of info on his background. It was obviously written by an insider with knowledge of the entire process, and is equally a madcap adventure and horribly sad, as the young companion, Shep (Schulberg’s persona), goes from hero worship to impatience, to pity. Old school Factory Hollywood was not only brutal to the actors, but the rest of the machinery as well, and fame was no shield for anyone.
A compelling read, and no wonder he did so well in screenplays. The dialogue was absolutely on point.
April 27, 2025
If you love Fitzgerald (and I do) you will undoubtedly love "The Disenchanted" by Budd Schulberg. This is one of those books you want to read aloud as you get to brilliant metaphors and images or revealing character moments. The story is simple: Manley Halliday, a stand-in for Fitzgerald, has been hired, along with a young writer Shep (a little like Nick in Gatsby) to write an inane feature for a big studio during Hollywood's Golden Age. This is Halliday's last chance to come back to life after squandering his talent over the last decade and to pay his debts, both financial and moral. Halliday had been THE writer of the 20s, and at first, Shep is in awe that he gets to work with the great man. But over the course of a few days as they head back East and Manley begins to drink again (at Shep's innocent prompting) we are taken into Halliday's both glorious and disreputable past. And Schulberg's beautiful, imagistic writing about a great man gone to ruin makes this a pleasure for anyone who admires beautiful sentences. Modern readers might be offended by the sometimes casual racism, anti-Semitism, sexism, and homophobia in the book. I myself was taken out of the story a few times by some of this, but Schulberg's beautiful writing and his sympathy for Halliday drew me back in. Highly recommended!
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June 28, 2020I don’t think it’s fair for me to rate this book because it just wasn’t for me. It wasn’t badly written and the characters and plot are what they are, being very much based on real life. Perhaps it was too brutally honest for me to be able to like it - the way Halliday thinks of Jere now she’s old and perhaps in need of additional care, for example, turned me off him very early on, as did the way Shep thought about Halliday - switching from reverence to disgust to pity. And it just all seemed so avoidable - I guess that’s what’s tragic about it, but to me it was infuriating. Apparently I’m deeply unsympathetic to both addicts and young people thrust into the role of carer without any prior knowledge that that will be their role.
I did enjoy the flashback scenes much more, I guess someone getting drunk and someone else vaguely trying to stop them from getting drunk gets repetitive very quickly.
Perhaps if the female characters had had a bit more pagetime, that would have redeemed it somewhat for me. I was far more interested in the perspectives of Jere, Ann, even Sara and Miss Dillon, than Shep and Halliday, himself. Is that because I’m female? Probably. They did seem very much as extras, though, which, to me, felt unfair to them.
I did enjoy the flashback scenes much more, I guess someone getting drunk and someone else vaguely trying to stop them from getting drunk gets repetitive very quickly.
Perhaps if the female characters had had a bit more pagetime, that would have redeemed it somewhat for me. I was far more interested in the perspectives of Jere, Ann, even Sara and Miss Dillon, than Shep and Halliday, himself. Is that because I’m female? Probably. They did seem very much as extras, though, which, to me, felt unfair to them.
April 13, 2018
Budding Talent
Before he wrote On the Waterfront and other tales, Budd wrote this sumptuous novel. Drawing on his movie studio knowledge, Schulberg created the story of F. Scott Fitzgerald inspired Manley Halliday's final days. Young Shep (the Budd character) is paired with the ageing superstar of the 1920's to write a college ice movie (Love On Ice) for the pretentious producer Victor Milgrim. Manley is a diabetic drunk and his fatal frolics in pursuit of cash drag him to an untimely end.
Schulberg could really write, as Anthony Burgess said in his preface to On the Waterfront, and The Disenchanted is a proper literary novel, full of fine, imaginative prose. It is far better than OTW and his later work - which are all good, readable stuff, but not on this level. Evidently he was discouraged by its failure to be hailed/make money/etc. and turned to more commercial writing. This is a shame - it is unlikely he was a spent force when he abandoned this type of novel writing. It may be predictable at times, but it is human, moving and imaginative throughout.
Well worth its 5*****.
Before he wrote On the Waterfront and other tales, Budd wrote this sumptuous novel. Drawing on his movie studio knowledge, Schulberg created the story of F. Scott Fitzgerald inspired Manley Halliday's final days. Young Shep (the Budd character) is paired with the ageing superstar of the 1920's to write a college ice movie (Love On Ice) for the pretentious producer Victor Milgrim. Manley is a diabetic drunk and his fatal frolics in pursuit of cash drag him to an untimely end.
Schulberg could really write, as Anthony Burgess said in his preface to On the Waterfront, and The Disenchanted is a proper literary novel, full of fine, imaginative prose. It is far better than OTW and his later work - which are all good, readable stuff, but not on this level. Evidently he was discouraged by its failure to be hailed/make money/etc. and turned to more commercial writing. This is a shame - it is unlikely he was a spent force when he abandoned this type of novel writing. It may be predictable at times, but it is human, moving and imaginative throughout.
Well worth its 5*****.
July 5, 2020
Amazing how old stories or "classics" have a way of being relevant no matter the era. Without giving an spoilers, this book can simply describe the current social media, Instagram, YouTube, etc craze. You can also see relevance in any trending topic/thing in the past or present.
The book takes place in the roaring 20s and the depression of the 30s. The author gives you two narrators from different generations, but both with important perspectives. Sporadic vs Steady. I'm not a fan of "live fast, die young" mentally and would prefer sustainability. Some people might use the phrase "peaking" to describe a characters highs and falls but I think this sheds light on ongoing problem our society has. What happens after I reach the top the "mountain"?
Overall, this is a good read and not anything profoundly new. It's just a reminder of how we can learn from the past to understand our current times. I'm not sure if there's a correct way to live your life and maybe life itself needs both in order for it prosper. I will say this; it's mostly likely that if starts with a "Bang" that it will end in a "whimper".
The book takes place in the roaring 20s and the depression of the 30s. The author gives you two narrators from different generations, but both with important perspectives. Sporadic vs Steady. I'm not a fan of "live fast, die young" mentally and would prefer sustainability. Some people might use the phrase "peaking" to describe a characters highs and falls but I think this sheds light on ongoing problem our society has. What happens after I reach the top the "mountain"?
Overall, this is a good read and not anything profoundly new. It's just a reminder of how we can learn from the past to understand our current times. I'm not sure if there's a correct way to live your life and maybe life itself needs both in order for it prosper. I will say this; it's mostly likely that if starts with a "Bang" that it will end in a "whimper".
August 5, 2020
A novel about F. Scott Fitzgerald's experience with Hollywood. In the book, F. Scott Fitzgerald is Manley Halliday. Asked by Shep if he wants his son to become a writer, Manley Halliday -the once famous writer of the Twenties- gives a blunt answer: "Rationally, no. It's really an awful curse to wish on anybody-from the day you begin you never completely relax again." Based partly on a writing assignment between the author, Budd Schulberg, and F. Scott Fitzgerald in 1939, The Disenchanted describes the struggle, disillusion and the fall of a great American writer. "American idea of success. Nothing fails like success. Write one bestseller here, one hit play, Big Success. Do one thing, get rich 'n famous. Writers get caught up in American system. Ballyhoo. Cocktail parties. Bestseller list. Worship of Success." (Manley Halliday)
Finally, there's not such thing as a second chance for Manley, especially in Hollywood.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budd_Sc...
https://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/07/tr...
Finally, there's not such thing as a second chance for Manley, especially in Hollywood.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budd_Sc...
https://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/07/tr...
July 17, 2024
I’m realizing that reading books that are inspired by The Great Gatsby or the life of its author brings me closer to understanding why The Great Gatsby is so great. The Disenchanted is not a bad novel but compared to the prim elegant prose of TGG this is a hairy, sweaty pot boiler. The Disenchanted is a novel written by the children of the Wilsons, the inheritors of the Valley of Ashes.
It’s called The Disenchanted but it could be called Death of Fitzgerald in the manner of David’s painting Death of Socrates but with more histrionics. I’m sure it itself inspired many stories of delusion, dissolution, dissipation and self destruction.
I was also struck by how one generation bears down on another in the novel. Here the ideological generation of the thirties is contemptuous of the freewheeling generation of the twenties. Today we have the boomers vs the Millennials and the Millennials vs Generation Z.
It’s called The Disenchanted but it could be called Death of Fitzgerald in the manner of David’s painting Death of Socrates but with more histrionics. I’m sure it itself inspired many stories of delusion, dissolution, dissipation and self destruction.
I was also struck by how one generation bears down on another in the novel. Here the ideological generation of the thirties is contemptuous of the freewheeling generation of the twenties. Today we have the boomers vs the Millennials and the Millennials vs Generation Z.
February 15, 2017
Una historia sobre un escritor ficticio en el ocaso de su vida. Halliday es un escritor de éxito que en su juventud lo ha tenido todo, pero el éxito le ha pasado factura. A los cuarenta parece que tenga 80 y las deudas por triplicado de los años entre esas dos cifras. Por ello tiene que escribir un maldito guión de cine.
El autor aprovecha para narrar el ambiente de los años 20 y las diferencias de esa generación con la joven de los años 30. Habla del éxito, de la escritura, de las fiestas, de la vida... Creando una biografía de un autor ficticio en este viaje por conseguir un guión decente que pague las facturas.
La verdad es que sin deslumbrar, solo en ocasiones en las que el autor se marca unas soberanas reflexiones, es una novela muy sólida y entretenida.
El autor aprovecha para narrar el ambiente de los años 20 y las diferencias de esa generación con la joven de los años 30. Habla del éxito, de la escritura, de las fiestas, de la vida... Creando una biografía de un autor ficticio en este viaje por conseguir un guión decente que pague las facturas.
La verdad es que sin deslumbrar, solo en ocasiones en las que el autor se marca unas soberanas reflexiones, es una novela muy sólida y entretenida.
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