Description

Dip into the dream-like glamour of the roaring twenties with F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1922 short story collection Tales of the Jazz Age. In this anthology, Fitzgerald’s stories fall into three categories: “My Last Flappers,” which include tales of excess and wildness; “Fantasies,” which includes the remarkable story, “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” about a man who starts life as an old man and grows younger with each year of his life; and “Unclassified Masterpieces,” which comprise some of Fitzgerald’s most light-hearted and unusual writing. Readers familiar with and new to this great American author can enjoy a rich sampling of his wit and imaginative exuberance in Tales of the Jazz Age.

About the Author

F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940) was born into a privileged family in St. Paul, Minnesota. Early on, the young Fitzgerald tried his hand at writing and saw his work appear in the school paper. Although not a stellar student, the young man attended Princeton University. While at college Fitzgerald began writing parts of what would become one of his most important works, This Side of Paradise. In 1917 the United States became involved in the First World War and Fitzgerald decided to join up and serve his country. He found himself at boot camp in Alabama, where he met the woman—Zelda Sayres—who would become his wife and closest companion in the wild and exciting decade to come. After the war's end, Fitzgerald went to work for a New York advertising agency and finally published his first novel. He and Sayres were married and throughout the 1920s they were one of the Jazz Age's most trend-setting couples, living a life of excess and fun in the spotlight. Fitzgerald and Sayres spent considerable time in Europe, where they moved in some of the most notable circles of the "Lost Generation," a community of artistic expatriates who lived and worked in the exciting world abroad. The decadent lifestyle that Zelda and Fitzgerald led would eventually bring a shadow of instability and destruction in its wake. Although he died at an early age, Fitzgerald's novels, such as The Great Gatsby and The Beautiful and Damned record a definitive moment in American culture, when new freedoms allowed a fleeting plunge into a world of inspiration and glamour.

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Opening Lines (Experimental)

Jim Powell was a Jelly-bean. Much as I desire to make him an appealing character, I feel that it would be unscrupulous to deceive you on that point. He was a bred-in-the-bone, dyed-in-the-wool, ninety-nine three-quarters per cent Jelly-bean and he grew lazily all during Jelly-bean season, which is ...