The Far Side of Paradise: A Biography of F. Scott Fitzgerald

by Arthur Mizener

A biography of F. Scott Fitzgerald

Genres: Biography, Nonfiction, American, The United States Of America

Hardcover

First published January 1, 1951

About the author

Arthur Moore Mizener was an American professor of English, literary critic, and biographer. After graduating from Princeton, Mizener obtained his master's degree from Harvard. From 1951 until his retirement in 1975, he was Mellon Foundation Professor of English at Cornell University. In 1951, Mizener published the first biography of Jazz Age writer F. Scott Fitzgerald titled The Far Side of Paradise.
In addition to authoring the first biography of Fitzgerald, Mizener proposed the now popular interpretations of Fitzgerald's magnum opus The Great Gatsby as a criticism of the American Dream and the character of Jay Gatsby as the dream's false prophet. He popularized these interpretations in a series of talks titled "The Great Gatsby and the American Dream."
Although Mizener's biography became a commercial success, Fitzgerald's friends such as critic Edmund Wilson believed the work distorted Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald's relationship and personalities for the worse. Consequently, scholars deemed Andrew Turnbull's 1962 biography Scott Fitzgerald to be a significant correction of the biographical record.
In 1971, Mizener released a biography about writer Ford Madox Ford titled The Saddest Story: A Biography of Ford Madox Ford that received critical acclaim but did not achieve the same commercial success. He later wrote a supplemental Fitzgerald biography titled Scott Fitzgerald And His World.

Reviews

[Lisa of Troy · Rating 1 out of 5]

“It was not until the 1950’s when popular interest in Fitzgerald was revived by publication of Arthur Mizener’s widely read biography of the author (The Far Side of Paradise) that readers began to find the additional depth in the book…”

This statement inspired me to read The Far Side of Paradise.

Where did this mysterious statement come from?

The card that came with my First Edition Library copy of The Great Gatsby.

Be wary of anything where someone won’t sign his or her name to it.

Because…..

This poorly written book did not propel Fitzgerald to stardom.

What really happened?

Yes, Fitzgerald died considering himself a failure. However, during World War II, the Council on Books in Wartime distributed books to American troops serving overseas. According to the Library of Congress (not an unnamed source), 155,000 copies of The Great Gatsby were distributed. For reference, only 20,000 copies were sold in the first year after publication.

That, my friends, is how Fitzgerald became famous.

Admittedly, no one loves F. Scott Fitzgerald as much as I do, but somehow Mizener took an exciting topic and transformed it into a sleep-inducing read.

F. Scott Fitzgerald would not approve of The Far Side of Paradise.

The best part of this biography is where Mizener would quote from Fitzgerald’s letters. But you can just read them for yourself in F. Scott Fitzgerald A Life in Letters.

The paragraphs in The Far Side of Paradise are barely readable, and the book assumes that the reader has a strong knowledge of all of Fitzgerald’s novels and their order of publication. Mizener did a simply deplorable job including proper dates with the year. For example, “In August, they went to Antibes for the month.” August of what year? “The services were held in a funeral parlor in Bethesda on December 27.” Again, what year?

Of course, readers can look up these dates on the Internet, but this book was written before the Internet, and Mizener couldn’t have relied on readers being able to do so.

The lack of dates becomes even more maddening when Mizener talks about the critical reception of The Last Tycoon. But it wasn’t published until after Fitzgerald died! Changing timelines without dates? Yes, that’s not confusing at all.

In addition to the other failures of this biography, Mizener claims that F. Scott Fitzgerald was a hypochondriac. Whoa! Mizener, stay in your lane, sir! Mizener has no medical training and isn’t qualified to accurately diagnose Fitzgerald. There is some record of Fitzgerald having malaria, mumps, tuberculosis, pleurisy, and two heart attacks. Mizener, just stick to writing bad books!

According to Wikipedia, Fitzgerald’s long-time friend, Edmund Wilson, also blasted The Far Side of Paradise, pointing out that Mizener never even met Fitzgerald and failed to capture the essence of Fitzgerald.

Mizener also failed to include the humorous story about when Hemingway and Fitzgerald got into a debate about “little Scott.”

Do yourself a favor and check out F. Scott Fitzgerald A Life in Letters and this funny biography on The Many Ways F. Scott Fitzgerald Made a Fool of Himself on YouTube.

[Insert in a mumbling tone] At least I can date things properly!

The Green Light at the End of the Dock (How much I spent):
Hardcover Text – $30 from eBay (the 1951 edition)

2025 Reading Schedule
Jan A Town Like Alice
Feb Birdsong
Mar Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Berniere
Apr War and Peace
May The Woman in White
Jun Atonement
Jul The Shadow of the Wind
Aug Jude the Obscure
Sep Ulysses
Oct Vanity Fair
Nov A Fine Balance
Dec Germinal

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[Tim · Rating 4 out of 5]

The main thing I took away from this biography is that Fitzgerald was a dreadful custodian of his talent, like an adolescent given a Ferrari to drive. He spent most of his life squandering the rare gift he had been given. It's a tragedy that he didn't at least write another couple of novels when he was in his prime. As a husband he was probably equally as wanting. As a friend he often repaid generosity with hostility. And, finally, as a father his overbearing draconian manner, riddled with hypocrisy, was irksome. Essentially it was alcohol that was responsible for bringing to the surface all the flaws in his character. As Hemingway said, he couldn't hold his drink. In fact, it was hard to like him most of the time in this biography.

It's interesting that all his scripts for Hollywood were rejected. More an indictment of the film industry, I felt, than any fault of his. After all, he always wrote brilliant dialogue.

This was like an overview of his life, thrifty with anecdotes. As my wife said in her review it's an early biography and probably there are now more detailed books about him and Zelda. However, it did its job and made me want to go back and read him again.

[Jim Dooley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is exactly the book that I wanted to read about the writer, F.Scott Fitzgerald. It not only provided an immersive detailing of his life, but also did an in-depth exploration of much of his writing, providing an even greater insight to his stories.

When I was growing up, the celebrity author who fell ... and fell very hard ... was Truman Capote. I was too young to read and appreciate his books and stories at the time, but I later found an incredible brilliance of expression that dazzled my mind. I later learned that he had the habit of commandeering easily definable acquaintances as characters.

Fitzgerald also did this, not only placing himself and his wife front and center as fictional characters, but many of his acquaintances, too. This caused people to be very uneasy around him. If he was watching you, he was probably mentally taking notes.

He is a wonderful example for struggling writers because he not only produced dazzling fiction ... he wrote a considerable amount of tripe, also. (He was also atrocious at spelling. How he would have adored spell-check!)

At the end of the book is a 3-part study of how an extended section of one of his books was put together. I found it intriguing to be able to study the Fitzgerald writing process. It is a very sound method, and much better than the Master Class approach that I studied from James Patterson.

Fitzgerald's desire to be entertaining and to keep the people around him amused was greatly responsible for his life-long problems with debt. He also viewed the process as needing to be the center of attention all the time (especially in his earlier years) which had an adverse impact on many relationships. One could argue that it also exacerbated his wife's mental state, and it definitely took a controlling turn with his daughter.

One of the ways to be constantly "on" was to drink, and Fitzgerald was a nasty and vindictive alcoholic. He would say that alcohol was needed to get him through the routine of writing, yet the majority of his lesser works were produced in that state. Truth to tell, I don't think he needed it for the writing processs ... he needed it to cope with critical reaction.

Fitzgerald would talk ... and write ... about being "emotionally bankrupt." He maintained that a person couldn't both save and spend, and that he had "spent" so much of his emotions that he was left with a gnawing emptiness. It is truly a chilling concept.

I've described many of the things that impressed me within the book, yet there is so much more. There is an analysis of whether TENDER IS THE NIGHT is a better book than THE GREAT GATSBY, or whether he would have been able to maintain the brilliance throughout his unfinished novel, THE LAST TYCOON. For those not interested in writing analysis, there is the fascination of watching a life lived as a flaming meteor, and despairing of the ash that remains.

I highly recommend this book.

[Gemma · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was originally published in 1951 and I’m sure more material has since come to light and that there are better, more detailed accounts of Scott Fiztgerald’s life. Truth be told I didn’t learn much that wasn’t in the Zelda biography I recently read. I suppose the most noteworthy thing about him is every time you begin to like him as a man he does something thoroughly reprehensible when he’s drunk, like smashing up a tray of trinkets a young gypsy girl is trying to sell or hitting Zelda. What was really good about this was the detailed analysis the author provides of all his major works. And it left me sad that Scott never finished The Last Tycoon.

[Ben · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Just when someone’s taken him up and is making a big fuss over him he pours the soup down his hostess’ back, kisses the serving maid and passes out in the dog kennel.”

Whenever I read a biography I always try to work out if I might have been pals with the subject. It’s easy to imagine getting on really well with Fitzgerald until his inner demon made its first appearance. That’s when he might burn down your house or poison your dog – just to get a laugh. Fitzgerald clearly was a combination of immense charm and self-destructive insecurity. His idea that vitality was a finite energy source like any natural resource is fascinating especially considering how much vitality he appeared to waste on drunken self-destructive exploits. His life appeared to be a merry go round of grand triumphs and ignominious rejections.

I picked up this biography in a charity shop and I suspect it’s now out of print. No doubt more exhaustive biographies of him have since been written. This book focuses as much on his work as the man behind the work and it does an admirably job of connecting the two. The literary criticism is first rate and certainly helped me understand the nature of Fitzgerald’s genius and flaws better. It did though leave me wanting to know more about Fitzgerald the man and certainly about his marriage to Zelda. A very fine read.

[Edward · Rating 3 out of 5]

After reading TENDER IS THE NIGHT which struck me as autobiographical, even given my sketchy knowledge of Fitzgerald’s life, I thought I’d read about him and picked up this early biography, begun 10 years after his death at age 44 in l940. There has been much written about Fitzgerald, the connections between his life and his work. I don’t know how this biography stacks up against others, but it seems impartial, recognizing both Fitzgerald’s virtues and faults, and satisfied my interest.

Fitzgerald said in the early 30’s that the three things he loved most in life were his work, his wife, Zelda, his daughter, Scottie, and drink, in that order It should have been reversed with drink coming first, and blotting out the others, never mind that it was # 4 Fitzgerald began serious drinking early in life and it destroyed his health and resulted in an early death from a heart attack He was a product of the roaring l920’s and thought, along with a lot of others, that anyone could do anything with no consequences. He tried anything, always living beyond his means, partying both in America and Europe during much of the 20’s. He supported himself with his writing – novels, commercial short stories, and several stints as a Hollywood screen writer At his peak, he was enormously popular, but that didn’t last much beyond a decade.

What makes Fitzgerald of interest is his writing talent. His most impressive achievement was his novel, THE GREAT GATSBY (1925), his tragedy of a man who was unable to transcend the affluent and corrupt society in which he finds himself. In a sense, that was Fitzgerald, who had a double vision, that of the enjoyment of world with all of its pleasures, and at the same time a moral standing aside and studying it, what has been called his “guilty priest” perspective Dick Diver in TENDER IS THE NIGHT (1933) is Fitzgerald as well, a man who ages and loses the capacity for feeling. He becomes jaded, suffers what Fitzgerald referred to as “emotional bankruptcy”

The reality that emerges in this biography is a sad sense of waste, both of a man’s talent and his life. One of the last things Fitzgerald wrote were lines for a poem which Mizener points out could have been his epitaph:

“Your books were in your desk
I guess and some unfinished
Chaos in your head
Was dumped to nothing by the great janitress
Of destinies”

At the time of his death, every one of his books was out of print, the novel he was working on, THE LAST TYCOON, was unfinished, and he felt he had been a failure. Only after his death did he receive critical acclaim

[Roman Clodia · Rating 4 out of 5]

He lived a colourful life and, in the end, a disastrous one, which is no less moving because much of the disaster was of his own making

A 1964 revision of Mizener's original 1951 biography which includes details of Fitzgerald's final love affair in Hollywood. Definitely a literary biography, it draws deeply on the stories and novels to both unpick and yet also intertwine Fitzgerald's life and his fiction.

While Bruccoli's 600pp. Some Sort of Epic Grandeur: The Life of F. Scott Fitzgerald is the standard academic biography, this earlier, shorter 'life' is useful for a quick run-through and insight into the glamorous yet doomed lifestyle and the brittle nature of the Fitzgeralds.

Mizener quotes at length from primary and secondary sources, and from the fiction of Fitzgerald to tie his analysis back to the texts. A slightly old-fashioned air about this but still a useful read.

[Lay · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome book. But sad.

"you can take off your hats, now, gentlemen," Stephen Vincent Benet wrote when The Last Tycoon appeared in 1941, "and I think perhaps you had better. This is not a legend, this is a reputation-and, seen in perspective, it may well be one of the most secure reputations of our time."

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

Still perhaps the most perceptive biography of Fitzgerald, although not entirely up-to-date. The saddest part of this story is that Fitzgerald died thinking he was a has-been who had wasted his talent. He had no idea his books and stories would be held in increasingly high regard. Today, nearly everyone who is educated has read Fitzgerald.

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

The classic book on the Fitzgeralds

[Alana Cash · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a very moving account of Fitzgerald's life. The strength of the book is that Mizener captures the missteps of Zelda and Scott - Zelda's descent into mental illness and Scott's slide into despair - as they got caught in emotional or psychological quicksand and each move they made trying to recapture youth, innocence, creative flow, exuberance, the past, just made things worse. The author carefully chose from Scott's letters to his daughter, Zelda, his editor and agent and friends, as well as Zelda's letters to Scott and others to represent the tragedy of their lives. In a letter to his daughter, Scott explains his almost immediate regret in marrying Zelda (her mother). In other letters to friends and colleagues he apologizes for his alcoholism and actions related to it. Most tragic are his descriptions about losing his ability to write and his sense of failure.

One of the weaknesses of the book, for me, was the academic discussions of Fitzgerald's books and their flaws. What Mizener thinks of the novels is irrelevant to the bio. And another weakness of the book is Mizener referring to Zelda's work as amateur (more than once) and not explaining how he came to use that particular term. I happen to enjoy her writing quite well, and her letters were lyrical.

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I learned a lot about Fitzgerald. My only "complaint" is that I have not read that much of Fitzgerald's work, which made a lot of the analysis of his writing fall flat for me. However that is my problem, not the book's. The book made me wonder, had Fitzgerald been held accountable for his excesses and behavior from the earliest days, he may have been a different human. If only he had not been a drunk, if only his wife was not hostile, if only he had some self discipline, if only he lived within his means, if only he did not obsess about being rich and confident, if only he went after the exact opposite of what he did go after .... and on and on. As it was, no matter what he did, the people around him let it pass, his wife enabled, along with his friends and acquaintances, more excesses and more drunkenness, and he rarely face consequences for his behavior. The result was devastating to his health, his own sanity and his wife's (and enabler's) sanity. A tragic biography. Now I need to read Zelda's side of this story.

[Esme Bowen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was dense at parts but it felt very accurate because Arthur knew him so he has a good point of view. Fitzgerald had a tragically beautiful life. His wife was depressed and he had minimal joy in his life. People say that Fitzgerald's life could have been one of his books and I couldn't agree more. A lot of the characters in his book are based of off real people that were in his life. The novel the beautiful and the damned was based off of his marriage and relationship with Zelda.

[Dottie · Rating 4 out of 5]

F.Scott Fitzgerald and his circle hold a seemingly endless fascination for me -- I suppose it's the cliche but it's also the truth. Zelda as well -- for me holds her own place both within the circle and on her own. From time to time, I pick up another book, another viewpoint and fall into the spell anew.

[Joseph · Rating 4 out of 5]

More of a literary biography than one targeted to the public at large; someone unfamiliar with most of Fitzgerald‘s work might find it difficult going, since it is replete with references to his novels and short stories.

[John Bardsley · Rating 1 out of 5]

This isn’t a biography of Fitzgerald but rather a general and severe critique of him and his work, which highlighted only his faults and shone not a single positive light on any part of him. The author zigzags back and forth through time in pursuit of this goal.

Waste of time.

[Penny Tunnell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Heartbreaking

This takes a good while to absorb but the time invested was worth it. Unforgettable. Leaves you wanting to read all Fitzgerald's works again in your lifetime.

[F. Schuermann · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the saddest - without being slushy and overblown - bios I've ever read. Poignantly beautiful.

[Mark Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

F. Scott Fitzgerald died in 1940. He feared that he was a forgotten writer, and in many respects he was. He hadn’t published a novel since 1934. The New York Times obituary of Fitzgerald said “Roughly, his own career began and ended with the 1920’s.” By the time the first biography of Fitzgerald appeared in 1951, The Far Side of Paradise, by Arthur Mizener, Fitzgerald was on his way to the pantheon of literary greats. The Armed Services edition of The Great Gatsby, distributed to soldiers in World War II, greatly increased the readership of Fitzgerald’s classic novel. The Portable F. Scott Fitzgerald, and The Crack-Up, both published in 1945, increased interest in Fitzgerald as well.

The Far Side of Paradise is a superb book, and I was impressed by Mizener’s handling of the material. As I was reading The Far Side of Paradise, I would think to myself “Oh, yes, I know that quote from his letters.” But it’s easy for me to know all of this, all these many years later, as I sit in my office among my shelves of many books by and about F. Scott Fitzgerald. But Mizener was the first person putting this material together, an impressive feat. Almost 75 years after it was first published, The Far Side of Paradise is an intelligent, penetrating look at Fitzgerald’s life.

Mizener was a perceptive critic of Fitzgerald’s writing. He writes in the Introduction “Fitzgerald’s work is full of precisely observed external detail, for which he had a formidable memory, and it is this gift of observation which has led to the superficial opinion that he was nothing but a chronicler of the social surface, particularly of the twenties. Yet, for all its concrete external detail, his work is very personal.” (p.xiii) I think this is why Fitzgerald’s work has been so durable. He was capturing his own times as they happened, and yet he was also able to make his writing timeless, so it speaks to us, more than a century later.

Mizener also does an excellent job of detailing Fitzgerald’s personality. His writing about Fitzgerald’s life still feels fresh. Mizener threads the needle of treating Fitzgerald sympathetically, but still detailing Fitzgerald’s behavior, which could be reckless and destructive when he was drunk.

Because Fitzgerald died so young, there were still plenty of his contemporaries around when Mizener was doing his research and writing. Henry Dan Piper was also researching Fitzgerald at this same time, and Piper graciously shared his papers with Mizener. (Piper’s own book F. Scott Fitzgerald: A Critical Guide, was published in 1965.) One of the best two-sentence summaries of Fitzgerald’s complicated personality came from a man who was at Officer’s Training School with Fitzgerald. He said of Fitzgerald, “he was eager to be liked by his companions and almost vain in seeking praise. At the same time he was unwilling to conform to the various patterns of dullness and majority opinion which would insure popularity.” (p.23) This captures Fitzgerald so well—he wanted to be liked, but he was far too intelligent to be a conformist.

Mizener perfectly describes the duality of Fitzgerald’s nature: “He writes like some kind of impassioned and naive anthropologist, recording with minuteness and affection and at the same time with an alien’s remoteness and astonishment.” (p.99) As Nick Carraway tells us in The Great Gatsby, “I was within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled by the inexhaustible variety of life.” (p.40) I suspect that was often how Fitzgerald himself felt.

Scott and Zelda moved to France in 1924, hoping to escape their chaotic life in Great Neck, Long Island. Instead, they merely found more chaos and disorder. One night, the Fitzgeralds ran into Isadora Duncan, the ballerina. Isadora was flirting too much with Scott, so Zelda wordlessly threw herself down a flight of stone steps. She was unhurt. The Fitzgeralds then drove off, but they turned onto railroad tracks. They slept in their car and were saved from injury the next morning when a farmer woke them up, shortly before the trolley came along and destroyed their car. (p.188) What can you do with two people who were so bent on self-destruction?

Mizener gives the reader glimpses of the charm and charisma that Scott exerted in person. He entertained people with card tricks; he created fun and intricate games for children. Robert Benchley wrote to Scott: “Anyone who gets down on his stomach and crawls all afternoon around a yard playing tin-soldiers with a lot of kids, shouldn’t be made unhappy. I cry a little every time I think of you that afternoon in Antibes.” (p.186) What a beautiful and touching letter.

The Fitzgeralds were living outside of Baltimore in June 1933 when Zelda accidentally started a fire on the top floor of the house they were renting. No one was hurt, and the damage was contained to the top floor. Mizener writes of Scott: “He would never have the house repaired because, he said, he could not endure the noise, and the macabre disorder of the place with its burnt-out and blackened upper story was a kind of symbol of the increased disarray of his own life.” (p.230)

Zelda’s mental breakdowns in 1930, 1932, and 1934 strained their marriage and their finances. After her third breakdown, Scott had to come to the realization that Zelda would never be cured. They saw each other occasionally, but they never lived together again. Scott’s sense of duty meant that he would not divorce Zelda. Nora Flynn observed Scott and Zelda at a party in the mid 1930’s. “They had loved each other. Now it was dead. But he still loved that love and hated to give it up—that was what he continued to nurse and cherish.” (p.264) Flynn’s observation reminds me of the end of Fitzgerald’s 1922 short story “Winter Dreams,” where Dexter Green says “Long ago...long ago, there was something in me, but now that thing is gone. Now that thing is gone, that thing is gone. I cannot cry. I cannot care. That thing will come back no more.”

Scott went to Hollywood in 1937, to work for MGM as a screenwriter. Mizener writes of the short stories Fitzgerald wrote in Hollywood, “These stories, in spite of their brevity—perhaps even because of it—are purer in motive and more directly and delicately written than any of Fitzgerald’s earlier stories.” (p.286)

There are shortcomings of the 1951 text of The Far Side of Paradise. Mizener doesn’t cover Zelda’s death—even in the updated 1965 edition, Mizener gets the year of her death wrong—it was 1948, not 1947. In the Foreword to the updated 1965 edition of The Far Side of Paradise, Mizener explains that friends of Sheilah Graham had told him that she did not want to discuss her relationship with Fitzgerald, so he tactfully omitted her name from the original text. Mizener did give the reader hints that Scott had a significant relationship in Hollywood at the end of his life. After Graham published her 1958 memoir Beloved Infidel, which discussed her relationship with Fitzgerald, Mizener re-wrote the last two chapters of The Far Side of Paradise to include Graham’s relationship with Fitzgerald.

There are many excellent biographies of F. Scott Fitzgerald, including Scott Donaldson’s Fool for Love, and Matthew J. Bruccoli’s Some Sort of Epic Grandeur. The Far Side of Paradise remains a key biography of Fitzgerald, and anyone who writes about Fitzgerald’s life owes Arthur Mizener a debt of gratitude.

The Far Side of Paradise ends beautifully. “He died believing he had failed. Now we know better, and it is one of the final ironies of Fitzgerald’s career that he did not live to enjoy our knowledge...now, a decade after Fitzgerald’s death, more of his work is in print than at any time during his life, and his reputation as a serious novelist is secure.” (p.300) Mizener’s ending needs no revision—the only change would be to update that it has now been almost 85 years since Fitzgerald’s death.

[Frederic · Rating 2 out of 5]

"The Great Gatsby" is a(n almost) Great Novel and a number of the short stories are Not Bad At All...Arthur Mizener does wonderful biographical research and writes a fine book filled with insight into the man and his work but FSF is such a pitiful,little bore that it's tough to get through...Hemingway,being an inveterate liar,painted such an overblown portrait of a pathetic 'Poor Scott'that I figured the truth must lie elsewhere...however,this evenhanded biography confirms that the Hemingway caricature was actually quite accurate...mean-spirited but accurate....

[Ms Jayne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Straight forward and interesting unpicking of the life of one of America's most admired writers. I came away with the most overwhelming sadness that he never got the appreciation he deserved and how alcohol addiction ruined his and Zelda's lives. This biography is a product of its time, skating over the sleaze and tabloid fodder which dominated the lives of the Fitzgeralds in the 20s and these days it might be more sensationalised but the knowledge and appreciation of his work is excellent.

[Jdrocks325gmail.com · Rating 3 out of 5]

Paradise

Was really an extraordinary read, which doesn't seem to tell you much. FSF's psychology is interesting, and it really gives you pause as to the Roaring 20s. It seems they didn't roar so much as drain the life out of you. This book made me glad I missed the whole thing!

[Alan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Onenight I caught "Beloved Infidel" on late night movies, and added Mizener, Zelda Fitzgerald, and Graham to my previous reading of Fitz' own books.

[Catie]

Mentioned in Zelda: A Biography by Nancy Milford - 1/22/2018

[Joseph Hirsch · Rating 5 out of 5]

“The Great Gatsby” is considered one of the few perfect books in American literary history. Its author, F. Scott Fitzgerald, is closely associated with the Jazz Age, and the spiritually riotous time directly preceding the Great Depression. And for those who like their romances doomed and a little morbid, the bold outlines of his affair with schizophrenic Southern belle Zelda Sayre are also the stuff of legend.

That’s the story now, at least. When Fitzgerald died, “The Great Gatsby” was mostly forgotten, except by some fellow scribes and a handful of critics who saw its genius even then. Fitzgerald always considered his later novel, “Tender is the Night,” to be a superior work, and (some of the) critics have hence come around to his way of thinking.

I’ve heard that this biography, “The Far Side of Paradise,” by Arthur Mizener, is partially responsible for rescuing Fitzgerald’s reputation from the ash heap. Regardless, it is a masterful affair, giving equal attention to the life and work of a master prose stylist. Fitzgerald has never been my favorite writer, but I have always enjoyed reading his stuff, and, like a lot of people, I stand in awe of the best. There are moments in “Gatsby” where some detail—a moonlit lawn, some woman’s face—is described so perfectly that it haunts the reader forever after. It’s one of the few works that lives up to its vaunted reputation, and perhaps even exceeds it.

Fitzgerald may have burnt himself out by striving so hard for such perfection so early in his career, but here the ends definitely justify the means. He wanted a little bit of immortality for his work, and wanted it more the more aware he became of how quickly the human animal can dissipate and decay. Especially when they indulge every whim and frequently. Fitzgerald got his wish; here is the story of how he acquired it, along with all of the more transitory and fleeting pleasures he wanted almost just as bad. Highest recommendation, with photos.

[Bonnye Reed]

MyNextRead

[Bill · Rating 3 out of 5]

Yeah, I really dislike this book. It carries the whole morality play version of Fitzgerald's life forward. Personally I'm not interested in some biographer's frown. When life comes to writers it is especially nuanced, almost to death, so don't bother to try to parse an author's actions and behavior as one motive or goal. Writers are many people trying to be one person, as F. S. F. said, and just as in the world too many of those people can be awful to one another.

[Alison]

It turns out I already knew everything in the first third of the book, so I'm betting I know the rest too.