In Perspective

One of the things I loved about F. Scott Fitzgerald was the point of view he uses. As I researched it, I found that his point of view and narrative techniques were some of the most defining parts of his style. The Great Gatsby is viewed as his best literary work in part because the point of view was so effective. Fitzgerald used different points of view to help show his themes. The points of view convey the emotion of the times, but also show the reality of the times.

His first novel, This Side of Paradise, is told by a third-person narrator, who is very much aware of what he is doing, and as much of an egotist as the main character Amory Blaine. "She had been born and brought up in France.... I see I am starting wrong. Let me begin again." The narrator appears very self-conscious of what he is doing. Throughout the novel, the choice to include all of Amory's poems is as much the narrator showing off as it is Amory.

F. Scott Fitzgerald once said, "the test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function." And that is exactly the way he wrote the point of view in The Great Gatsby - with this kind of double vision. The story is told from the first-person point of view of Nick Carraway, who both participates in the Jazz Age lifestyle, and observes and judges it. "Do you want to hear about the butler's nose?" Daisy asks him, to which he responds; "That's why I came over to-night." Nick is involved in the lavish, meaningless lifestyles of so many, but he can also evaluate it critically. "I wanted no more riotous excursions with privileged glimpses into the human heart." The double vision he possesses allows us, the readers, to feel the emotion and excitement of living at that time, but to also see the truth.

In his writing, and especially in This Side of Paradise and The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald uses point of view techniques to their fullest potential. Through the different points of view - even in the same novel- Fitzgerald portrays his characters and the world he lived in.

The Romantic Egotist

So here I was with all these plans to blog every day this month about something to do with Mr. Fitzgerald. But as you can see, I've failed miserably at that. I have been doing research and I have been reading lots and lots in This Side of Paradise. But I guess I've been looking for something more exciting. I mean, everyone knows that F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote The Great Gatsby and he was part of a movement called the "Jazz Age". I wanted to find something more exciting to talk about. And then Thursday, I discovered this:

That's actually Fitzgerald, reading Keats' "Ode to A Nightingale"

And then I started thinking, about Keats (another of my favorites) and Fitzgerald and This Side of Paradise. You see, This Side of Paradise is full of allusions to the romantic poets. Amory Blaine has a poem for almost every occasion in his life. So I went searching, and as it turns out Keats was a major influence on F. Scott Fitzgerald's writing. And then I started thinking more and more about this whole thing. Of course, the title of book one of This Side of Paradise is called "The Romantic Egotist", so this whole underlying theme of romanticism was present in my mind, but I never thought about it that much. And when you get to thinking about it, it really makes sense. Here we read these books about horrible, disgustingly selfish people and somehow, we love them and find something endearing in them. There is nothing redeeming about Daisy Buchanan or Jay Gatsby, and yet we love their story and even pity their end. Amory Blaine is the epitome of narcissism, and yet, I find myself charmed and intrigued while reading about him.

I remember telling my mom when I decided to do my author project on Fitzgerald, "He writes about depravity. The stories are awful. But his language is what makes the books so great." And that's really the truth. If we take away the poetic language, we find something utterly disgusting. But these stories have been romanticized so that even the nastiest, most snobbish human being can seem lovable.

In a wonderful article I found on the New York Times website (you should read the whole thing if you get the chance: http://www.nytimes.com/books/00/12/24/reviews/001224.24craint.html) it said, "what flowers were to Keats, the leisure of the upper classes was to Fitzgerald -- lush, sensuous and real, a symbol of the ideal that was also a fragile thing, as ephemeral as pleasure." It also says, "It wasn't necessarily fair that the rich had more leisure -- or more flowers -- than other people, but since they did, Fitzgerald wrote about them."

• Crain, Caleb. "F. Scott Fitzgerald Was Different." The New York Times. 24 Dec. 2000. Web.

"I know I'll wake up some morning and find that the debutantes have made me famous overnight."

This Side of Paradise, F. Scott Fitzgerald's first novel, tells the story of the youth of Fitzgerald's day like no other novel ever written. Released in 1920, this novel was an immediate success. It was received well by the older generation, and was also well-loved by the young. The release of this novel marked the beginning of the Jazz Age, an era that began with the end of World War I and continued until the1930s brought the start of the Great Depression. This Side of Paradise challenged tradition and is a landmark in modernist fiction. It has been widely criticized as simply being a bundle of short-stories and indeed does show the young author's naivety, but its unique structure is also a vital part of what makes it innovative. Although this novel is considered to be a part of the modernist movement, Fitzgerald developed a distinctly American literary identity with this novel, setting himself apart from his European contemporaries who headed the modernist movement.

"The glorious spirit of abounding youth glows throughout this fascinating tale," said an article entitled "With College Men" which appeared in The New York Book Review on May 9th 1920. And indeed, "the youth" were the biggest readers of this book. It was very popular with the younger generation and in colleges. But this novel was only part of what identified him as an icon of the "jazz age"--his short stories and intriguing personal life were mainly responsible for that.

Fitzgerald's second novel, The Beautiful and the Damned, was not nearly has successful as This Side of Paradise and his popularity declined after its release. The Great Gatsby was more well received than The Beautiful and the Damned, but was still not as popular as the novelist's first book. However, This Side of Paradise remained in vogue with readers until Fitzgerald's decline into alcoholism.

Attention wasn't turned back to Fitzgerald until many years after his death, with the release of Arthur Mizener's analytical biography of the author (c.1951). After that, Fitzgerald's books were incorporated into the literary canon and by the early 2000s he was considered to be one of the most important novelists of the twentieth century. Although This Side of Paradise has been less esteemed than The Great Gatsby or Tender is the Night, it is nevertheless viewed as a landmark achievement of the Jazz Age. Critics continue to write about this novel from nearly all analytical perspectives.