It is also a gripping account of the complexities of marriage, largely based on Fitzgerald's relationship with his wife, Zelda. Designed to appeal to the booklover, the Macmillan Collector's Library is a series of beautiful gift editions of much loved classic titles. Macmillan Collector's Library are books to love and treasure. I watched because Fitzgerald, through his words, has the ability to capture an era, a group of people and places as through a movie camera.
We observe millions of small thing each perfectly portrayed - light slanting through blinds, nasty arguments, NYC on a hot summer night, cocktail parties with insipid, meaningless chatter. The reader recognizes a world that does exist. I liked this realism and it is this that drew me to the book.
At the same time, the writing is definitely patchy. There are sections that are a total bore. The beginning is horrible. It took me quite a while before I knew I would not abandon the book. Anthony is lazy, self-centered and shallow. Gloria she is lazy, self-centered and shallow too.
No goals and no aspirations, except maybe having a beautiful wife by his side, alcohol in unlimited quantity and being entertained by others. Gloria, for her beauty is everything.
Her guiding principle is to never do anything for another. The two are married. And if that dream comes true, what then? There is humor to be found in the lines. It is cynical. It is full of irony. Intellectualism is scoffed at.
Here follow some examples: -They were in love with generalities. This was about war. Not all of the humor is serious though. What I am saying again, in just another way, is that the writing has a style of its own and it is special. Just so you are warned - the book is a product of its own time. It was published in and draws the era before and after the First World War. It has racist lines. What is assumed and taken for granted then does not represent how we think today.
Well, for most of us. The audiobook is narrated by William Dufris. He turns this into a theatre production. I would have preferred a simple reading of the lines. He dramatizes; he interprets the text for you. I have to admit though, that at times he did have me laughing. I kind of got used to the narration; while at the beginning it drove me nuts, by the end I was desensitized. So what am I thinking as I complete the book? You simply cannot change people! Is that what Fitzgerald wanted to say?
I have read that the book is based on his life with Zelda. Is he observing and recording? The book certainly has something to say about work and life goals, but this message is so obvious there has to be more.
Scot Fitzgerald fans. Shelves: wtf , classics , beautiful-writing , s. Anthony is young, lazy, handsome, and bored with the world. He spends his days having meals with his companions, Maury and Richard, and participating in the art of 'doing nothing'. When Richard introduces Anthony to his cousin Gloria, the world is suddenly a bit less boring.
Gloria is beautiful, with childish features and, like Anthony, bored easily. But Anthony is the first man in a long string of dull romances that she does not tire of. The two marry and are at the height of their lives. But An Anthony is young, lazy, handsome, and bored with the world. But Anthony and Gloria are almost too much of alike to be compatible. Both are incessantly bored and restless, neither wanting to get a job but continuing to spend money lavishly. The Beautiful and Damned is accurately named, as it follows the slow but steady decline of a middle-upper class 's couple.
I've said it before and I'll say it again; I love F. I will read anything he writes and am unable to dislike it. His stories seem rather pointless at first but become something more as the novel goes on. Sort of. I don't really have a reason for loving the guy so much. Other people might think differently. He writes a tale almost frighteningly similar to his own sad life to come; a failing marriage, a secret affair, Anthony's addiction to alcohol, Gloria's growing mental unstability, etc.
Scott heavily takes his own life experiences out and into the book. It's as if he's foreshadowing his own demise. Anyway, Fitzgerald makes unlikeable characters surprisingly likeable. I'm mostly talking about the defiant, sassy as hell Gloria. Anthony can go jump off a building for all I care. Gloria's such a naive, unsympathetic character that I can't help but adore her simply for her moments of weird outbursts and occasional sass.
She's spoiled and at times unreasonable but there's just something about her that I like. Anthony had a problem with not being able to say 'no' or to stand up for himself. I sympathized with him at first but he grew to be a real dick Caramel -snickers-. Once again, Fitzgerald has written an enjoyable novel of the 's, proving that boredom and laziness can be a dangerous habit with unpleasant consequences.
Feb 20, Elena rated it really liked it. I found this book fascinating and also really problematic. Fitzgerald's class prejudices and racism are on parade, and it's a horrifying parade. So when his hero and heroine start to come apart, we understand that it's bigger than Anthony's alcoholism or Gloria's spending. It's really interesting to note how Anthony's troubles presage Fitzgerald's own. These are the best and most convincing parts of the book, too.
Actually, the degeneracy is a bit harrowing at times, but sometimes I enjoy a good harrowing. Fitzgerald really understands both privilege and failure, and so if you're interested in this combination, The Beautiful and Damned is an excellent exploration of the two.
Fitzgerald left me gasping for breath, depressed at the end of the novel. The demise of Gloria and Anthony Patch and their ill-fated relationship incredibly drawn out. But the intricacies of each character is highly developed. I thought I was actually friends with these characters.
It's an excellent read though it's not the most action-packed. I loved the dense descriptives, and the way he portrays Gloria's vanity: "Beauty is only to be admired, only to be loved -- to be harvested carefully and Fitzgerald left me gasping for breath, depressed at the end of the novel.
I loved the dense descriptives, and the way he portrays Gloria's vanity: "Beauty is only to be admired, only to be loved -- to be harvested carefully and then flung at a chosen lover like a gift of roses.
It seems to me, so far as I can judge clearly at all, that my beauty should be used like that View 1 comment. Aug 25, Alice-Elizabeth added it Shelves: alice-reads-adult-fiction , read-in , alice-reads-classics. I'm going to say this now. Reading this book caused me to not only fall into an extreme reading slump, it also was the book that got me back into the book blogging world. Please note that my rant review does contain a couple of spoilers regarding the storyline.
I don't put spoiler reviews onto my Goodreads, hence why I won't be copying my review for The Beautiful and the Damned over. If you are I'm going to say this now. If you are interested in reading the review, click on the above link! If you would like to subscribe to my blog, you can either through a WordPress account or a valid email address.
View all 4 comments. Apr 18, Milica rated it really liked it. I read about Fitzgerald's life afterwards and I realized that Gloria and Anthony were heavily inspired by Zelda and him. That is heartbreaking, but also brutally honest if it's true. The ending was fitting and kinda unexpected, the story was depressing, but it depicted the war-post-war jazz era realistically and without restraint and embellishments.
Jun 26, Madeline rated it liked it. As you may know, Reader, I struggled to get through George Eliot's masterpiece cue massive eyeroll Middlemarch. Refer to my review for a detailed explanation, or just read the next sentence of this one. It was boring, basically. There isn't really a plot, it's just a description of some people going about their daily lives with nothing very dramatic ever happening.
The same can be said of the plot term is used loosely here of The Beautiful and Damned : rich people are miserable, make poor mar As you may know, Reader, I struggled to get through George Eliot's masterpiece cue massive eyeroll Middlemarch. The same can be said of the plot term is used loosely here of The Beautiful and Damned : rich people are miserable, make poor marriage and life choices, continue to be miserable, the end. I can't say with authority that that's how Middlemarch ends because I didn't finish it, but that's what happened in the first pages So, logically, I should have hated this book as much as I hated Eliot's.
But I didn't, and I think I know why: Fitzgerald's characters are interesting , and their self-destruction is a lot more fascinating than the people at Middlemarch. In that one, Dodo and company were more like unsuspecting tourists wandering too close to the edge of a cliff, about to tumble over without ever knowing what hit them. Anthony and Gloria, the main characters in this book, take a different approach: they run, roaring drunk and screaming, right for the cliff's edge and never look back.
It's much more compelling and amazing and sad, and I'm still going to be mean and give the book just three stars because I am adamant that good books should have plots, dammit. Also, I'm just going to say this and then hide from the Eliot fans' scorn and fury: Fitzgerald is a better writer. And he's funnier. Before you start flaming me in the comments about how I don't know what I'm talking about well, DUH , I will present the following quotes from The Beautiful and Damned to support my claim: "A stout woman upholstered in velvet, her flabby cheeks too much massaged, swirled by with her poodle straining at its leash - the effect being given of a tug bringing in an ocean liner.
Just behind them a man in a striped blue suit, walking slue-footed in white-spattered feet, grinned at the sight and catching Anthony's eye, winked through the glass. Anthony laughed, thrown immediately into that humor in which men and women were graceless and absurd phantasms, grotesquely curved and rounded in a rectangular world of their own building.
They inspired the same sensations in him as did those strange and monstrous fish who inhabit the esoteric world of green in the aquarium. Irony was the final polish of the shoe, the ultimate dab of the clothes-brush, a sort of intellectual "There!
As you first see him he wonders frequently whether he is not without honor and slightly mad, a shameful and obscene thinness glistening on the surface of the world like oil on a clean pond, these occupations being varied, of course, with those in which he thinks himself rather an exceptional young man, thoroughly sophisticated, well adjusted to his environment, and somewhat more significant than any one else he knows.
In this state he considered that he would one day accomplish some quiet subtle thing that the elect would deem worthy and, passing on, would join the dimmer stars in a nebulous, indeterminate heaven half-way between death and immortality. Until the time came for this effort he would be Anthony Patch - not a portrait of a man but a distinct and dynamic personality, opinionated, contemptuous, functioning from within outward - a man who was aware that there could be no honor and yet had honor, who knew the sophistry of courage and yet was brave.
View all 5 comments. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby" is a novel Im sure everyone is familiar with from high school, and in my case was the only book I ever picked up from the author until I came across "The Beautiful and Damned".
Unlike other books that were recommended by friends and acquaintances, reading Fitzgerald's second novel derived from my curiosity for a rarely mentioned era of American history; one encompassing the age of wild jazz, speakeasies, and the notorious flappers.
As an author, Fitzgeral F. As an author, Fitzgerald is most well-known today for his literary depiction of urban life in the early 19th century, while vividly defining the vanity, recklessness, and materialism engulfing its youth. Though a Harvard graduate with doors of opportunity, Anthony frequents his evenings at nightclubs and theaters, enjoying a few drinks with his ne'er-do-well friend, Maury, and Dick, the aspiring novelist writing a romance.
In the mornings, he describes his immaculately decorated and tasteful apartment, and the attendance of his own private valet. Because of his family stock, Anthony earns a good sum of income every year and finds no reason to spend his youth climbing the corporate ladder as his grandfather advises him to. Soon, he becomes enraptured by Dick's beautiful cousin, Gloria Gilbert.
Her seamless perfection and rebellious, free-spirited attitude enflames Anthony's obsession for her and he eventually decides to marry her off. Their honeymoon across the states and first year together in a summer home outside of New York is a perfect match to their desires for ease and comfort.
However, when Anthony's grandfather passes away leaving him destitute by his will, their anticipated future of privilege slowly deteriorates between time-consuming court appeals and insurmountable debts. Their lives descend into indolence and alcoholism, and Anthony's attempts to reprieve himself of his slovenly past yield nothing but a disgraced military venture and his pitiless failure as a door-to-door salesman. Though we feel inclined to sympathize for Anthony's dying self-esteem, and Gloria's squandered attempts in becoming an actress, while trying to maintain her crumbling relationship with her husband, "The Beautiful and Damned" is not meant to be a novel of romantic or sentimental values.
Fitzgerald's book serves as a commentary on the repercussions of excess and the hypocrisy of entitlement and social ranking in a world less deserving of such prestige. Amidst this gloomy and daunting tale of fading passions, domestic struggles, and mental decadence comes a complex story of illusory hopes and dreams.
Shelves: classics , to-re-read , american , written-ins , male-author , They marry and become the it couple everyone wants to be with. Their nights are full of champagne and parties, and the days are spent in idleness, waiting for the next party to fill the void. What now? Nor is Anthony capable of holding on to a job.
The Beautiful and Damned was an incredible reading experience. The writing was so beautiful that it took me ages to read this book. I turned the pages carefully and read passages over and over again, devouring each word like a delicious piece of chocolate. Inspired by Your Browsing History. A Death in the Family. Somerset Maugham. The House of Mirth. Edith Wharton. Light in August. William Faulkner. Other Voices, Other Rooms.
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