hello 
friends and we are continuing with our week
five lecture ah on the american novel so this
entire week has been devoted as you know to
ah the development growth and the various
landmarks in the american novel we have already
talked about a couple of novelists and today
i am going to talk about ah one of the greatest
ever f scott fitzgerald ah who is the author
of the classic the great gatsby about which
i will be talking but also i will be talking
about his other accomplishments also ah his
he was married to ah another writer
although ah they not a much ah production
or volume of or body of work that came out
of zelda his wife zelda sayre so f scott fitzgerald
and the jazz age the lost generation american
dream and why why did i ah write zelda so
prominently here because of zeldas important
significance and her position in his life
and also in his works particularly with reference
to tender is the night now ah there is a famous
exchange between f scott fitzgerald and hemingway
ernest hemingway hemingway who ah both of
these both these men the great writers they
had met in paris
just after the first world war and they were
called collective[ly] i mean not collectively
but along with other writers group of writers
ah they were called the writers of the lost
generation and fitzgerald said the rich are
different then you and me and hemingway said
yes they have more money yeah although ah
this was you know this was a kind of an encounter
between hemingway and literary critic mary
colum ah hemingway said i am getting to know
the rich and colum said i think you will find
the only difference between the rich and other
people is that the rich have more money now
hemingway wrote a famous story called the
rich boy its a part of his collection and
it was nineteen twenty six
and he says let me tell you about the very
rich they are different from you and me they
possess and enjoy early and it does something
to them makes them soft where we are hard
cynical where we are trustful in a way that
unless you are born rich it is very difficult
to understand now this is a famous quotation
it can be asked in several ways ok so whether
it comes to you in the form of the exchange
between hemingway ah which has become a part
of ah the legend or the folklore of ah hemingway
and [fitz/fitzgerald] fitzgerald friendship
or whether it comes to in the form of the
exchange between hemingway and mary colum
or the actual quotation the full quotation
from the rich boy
so please be alert to that ah hemingway ah
eighteen ninety six to nineteen forty just
forty four year old and at age forty four
he died of a heart attack he was named after
francis scott key the author of the united
states national anthem um the star spangled
banner so thats the origin of his name and
thats [wa/what] what he was ah thats who he
was named after he was born in minnesota lived
in new york most of the time and studied at
princeton university the celebrated university
princeton university from nineteen thirteen
to seventeen he also joined the army although
quite briefly and after his [dis/discharge]
discharge from the army in nineteen nineteen
he moved to new york city he found literary
success with this side of paradise it was
published in nineteen twenty he also wrote
tales of the jazz age ok the what is jazz
age that we are going to see soon ah it was
his second collection of short or short stories
that contains one of his most famous short
stories the diamond as big as the ritz he
also wrote the beautiful and the damned in
nineteen twenty two which was also adapted
to their screen and many of his novels were
adapted for the cinema
he had an unsuccessful stint at hollywood
as screenwriter zelda sayre and her importance
so he ah married zelda ah who was the daughter
of um a very wealthy supreme court judge and
this marriage took place in nineteen twenty
ah fro[m] once zelda came into his life he
started living life the kings absolutely king
size or queen size in fact zelda and francis
scott they were together called the prince
and princes of the new york society soon they
settled at home ah in westport which is in
connecticut and they continued ah the lifestyle
of the rich and famous ah and based on because
it was a very tumultuous wild ah relationship
which i which had its ah which had great moments
of ups and downs and this all this is captured
in hemingways novel tender is the night which
was published in nineteen thirty four zelda
felt bad that nicole [dry/diver] diver the
character in tender is the night was modeled
after her and its not perhaps not a very flattering
[pro/portrait] portrait in nineteen twenty
seven ah fitzgeralds rented the twenty seven
bedroom mentioned ah it was called ah ellerslie
near delaware so a famous mansion and a huge
mansion fit for a king ah still he had to
ah work hard to live up to this princely lifestyle
ah he was increasingly turning to alcohol
and sometimes also becoming quite abusive
zelda was a ah impulsive and she would often
embarrass himself herself as well as ah fitzgerald
in front of friends and also his strangers
for a couple of years the couple traveled
ah back and forth between ah new york and
baltimore they also traveled ah to and stayed
in europe for months at a time sometimes with
fellow americans in paris the riviera khans
saint raphael capri antabuse and rome so ah
what we call today the jet setting crowd and
the jet setting jet setting couple in nineteen
thirty they were in north africa and thats
the year when zelda had a nervous breakdown
she was in and out of a clinics in and asylums
and sanatorium in switzerland and died in
nineteen forty eight hemingways ah sorry fitzgerald
age is called the roaring twenties an age
that symbolizes social artistic and cultural
dynamism we have to remember after the first
world war the so called normalcy it returned
to politics ah and also redefine modern womanhood
this we have been referring to quite often
that ah the entire concept of general rules
ah went through ah a lot of rethinking and
shift after the first world war for obvious
reasons men were away women had to join the
workforce they started becoming um more active
in decision making so the idea of womanhood
had to be naturally redefined so ah these
were the this was the time when movements
such as art deco surrealism and expressionism
they were finding a fertile soil in europe
jazz music ok so therefore we had movie the
first ever talkie jazz singer in nineteen
twenty seven all these factors or all these
cultural phenomenon went on to inform hemingways
over ah we al[so] we must also remember the
wall street crash of nineteen twenty nine
which sort of punctuated the end of the roaring
twenties and the beginning of mark the beginning
of the great depression however soon there
was industrial growth ah and then consumer
demands and expirations increased there were
significant changes in lifestyle and culture
this is also the time of harlem renaissance
that is the post world war the population
in harlem or the upper manhattan that was
exclusively black harlem became the center
of african american culture people like langston
hughes countee cullen w e b du bois and james
[bal/baldwin] baldwin they baldwin they are
all the ah products of the harlem renaissance
and the jazz age what was it an age of miracles
thats what he calls in his work echoes of
jazz age it was an age of miracles it was
an age of art it was an age of access and
it was an age of satire so this is something
that you find everything all the time in fitzgerald
works accesses art art deco ok he is a modernist
of course but then he also borders to access
and there is satire in his works and sometimes
you know that he is laughing at his own type
also the lost generation is referred to the
writers post the first world war
particularly the expatriates ah we know ah
that after the during the week of the war
and during the war in the week of the war
during the war there were a host of young
men who were killed and those who survived
what happened to them perhaps they were wounded
morally or physically hemingways the sun also
rises and that character of the hero jake
barnes he is the epitome of the so called
the lost generation so this young ah generation
was adrift morally spiritually sometimes even
physically the mood was of [cyni/cynicism]
cynicism
and disenchantment ok so ah fitzgerald hemingway
erich maria remarque ah t s eliot ezra pound
ok they were the writers of this age gertrude
stein she called them you are you all of you
are you know a we are a generation we are
a lost generation thats what she remarked
on this group of expatriates who after the
disillusionment of the first world war went
to live in europe for a long time especially
in paris this was heming[way] ah sorry fitzgeralds
age was also the age of the radical thirties
writers became radically political and concerned
with social causes for example faulkner william
faulkner
and dos passos and thomas wolfe john steinbeck
who famously wrote the grapes of wrath clifford
odets the great dramatist eugene o neill so
this is also one important feature of the
large generation and the radical thirties
fitzgeralds books or works or stories are
marked by the themes of love and success transformation
ah alcoholism ok and social excesses social
mobility but then he critiques also as an
the great gatsby which is his magnum opus
nineteen twenty five he critiques here belief
in the belief in american dream that anyone
can be a success yes gatsby does become a
success but at what price and does he i mean
he fitzgeralds also questions
whether there is a class system or not whether
social hierarchies and boundaries can be completely
erase which he feels that yes or that rather
no they cannot be the hero jay gatsby is a
self made man he loves to display flaunt his
wealth he tries to construct a new past for
himself ok all all this he does in order to
win back his lady love daisy who he voluntarily
gave up once upon a time because he felt that
he wasnt rich enough or good enough and he
ah pledged to himself that he one day he will
come back and he will be so wealthy that she
will be attracted to his wealth and glamour
and sophistication he sort of tries to buy
his way into daisys society
dai[sy] when he returns he finds daisy married
to someone called tom buchanan ah someone
who belong to the old rich new york family
gatsbys idea of the american dream is anyway
doomed from the start because he tries to
buy his way into ah society that never accepts
him so nouveau riche versus old money interestingly
gatsby gets his idea of how to achieve the
american a dream from the works of benjamin
franklin poor richard you know his autobiographic
benjamin franklins autobiography is called
poor richard and the emphasis is on industrialist
industriousness frugality and to um encourage
new sorts of experiences therefore meyer wolfshiem
in the great gatsby at one time ah shows
nick carraway the narrator of the great gatsby
and old book of gatsby who is no more now
which has a daily schedule at the back of
it and what does it say ah practice elocution
poise and how to attain it read one improving
book or magazine per week and be better to
parents so these all all these things that
should come naturally to most people gatsby
learns from reading poor richards almanack
and tries to follow it to that he naively
believing that this is by following all the
you know ticking all that to do list bullet
points he is going to make it to the so called
right society he also felt that plan[ing]
by planning out every minute of his ah day
by being punctual by attaining wealth
he could win the love of his life daisy the
great gatsby is also remarkable for its setting
the west egg and the east egg these are fictional
names however the great neck in the new york
is ah in new york sorry is [thickly/thinly]
thinly disguised as west egg ok and ah this
is a counterpoint to ah manor [havem/haven]
haven and sands point which was a inspiration
for the more posh east egg the next peninsula
over on long island great neck symbolized
the decadence of the roaring twenties as it
extended out from new york city into the dent
remote suburbs the western in contrast attracts
the nouveau riche ok so ah gats[by] so in
a way see fitzgeralds was himself fascinated
by the life of the rich
and famous he never made any bones about not
wanting to join that elite club all his expensive
holidays his wild parties and also the kind
of mention that he and ah his wife rented
and invited his friends to admire when what
was that nothing but an attempt to ah to belong
to an exclusive club likewise in the great
gatsby the new money it tries desperately
to situate itself into the that into that
level of wealth that the people of the east
egg were born into at this point i want you
to look at these beautiful lines from the
great gatsby please look at the slide here
look at the quotation
ah her porch was bright with the bought luxury
of star shine the wicker of the settee squeaked
fashionably as she turned toward him and he
kissed her curious and lovely mouth she had
caught a cold and it made her voice huskier
and more charming than ever and gatsby was
overwhelmingly aware of the youth and mystery
that wealth imprisons and preserves of the
freshness of many clothes and of daisy gleaming
like silver safe and proud above the hot struggles
of the poor this [cha/character] character
of daisy you know ah scholars have pointed
out that daisy symbolizes american dream look
at all the glittering words here star shine
fashionably even this settee squeaked fashionably
ok
and then ah even if we ah she has caught cold
her voice at least to ah to the hero gatsby
sounded more charming and the youth mystery
that wealth preserves these are the operating
words freshness of many clothes not just a
few clothes many clothes ok so that every
time you wear something they look fresh and
bright and shiny and daisy gleaming like silver
safe and proud above the hottest struggles
of the poor the rich are always shiny and
thats what he aspires to thats what fitz[geralds]
ah thats what gatsby aspire to ok
so all his life he struggled to attain that
ever elusive american dream and daisy epitomizes
everything that is bright shiny beautiful
and american in many of his short stories
ah fitzgeralds explore ideas and situations
which were later reworked in his longer friction
so description of settings which were devised
in fitzgeralds story winter dreams in nineteen
twenty two became part of the detail of daisys
home in the great gatsby similarly ah fitzgeralds
also used inspiration from jacobs [la/ladder]
ladder which is his nineteen twenty seven
story as character ideas for tender is the
night now tender is the night is a nineteen
thirty three book a novel ah noted for its
power
and brilliance and [elegan/elegance] elegance
but then many founded objectionable for the
way he derived from his ah own life you know
own life and also zeldas life his and zeldas
life together ah the story is set i mean after
the onset of the or following the onset of
the great depression in nineteen twenty nine
now ah this is this is a time when americans
were not really interested in celebrating
lives of the glamorous and the rich because
tender is the night is all about the very
wealthy who li[ve] americans who live in europe
especially in french riviera
so the book was criticized at the time of
its publication but today it is acknowledged
as a a classic even hemingway who was a great
supporter of fitzgerald he ah criticized fitzgerald
for drawing his characters too much upon the
templates of real people fitzgerald too acknowledged
ah this problems along with some more serious
problems and often wishing that he could have
altered the chronology of the book or had
been able to rewrite the final section um
we will be talking or i will be showing passages
from tender is the night but before that i
want you to look at this particular passage
this li[ne] this passage
particularly interested me while i was going
through the novel for the benefit of this
course ah is because of the literary device
and compression of time look at the number
of things that happen in this one single paragraph
and then you cant help but marvel at fitzgeralds
elegance of prose so look at the ah slide
here bick dick is the hero nicole is the heroin
and dick is sort of you know based on fitzgerald
himself nicole is based on zelda dick opened
an office in buffalo but evidently without
success nicole did not find what the trouble
was but she heard a few months later that
he was in a little town named batavia
n y practicing general medicine and later
that he was in lockport doing the same thing
by accident she heard more about his life
there than anywhere that he bicycled a lot
was much admired by the ladies and always
had a big stack of papers on his desk that
were known to be an important treatise on
some medical subject almost in process of
completion he was considered to have fine
manners and once made a good speech at a public
health meeting on the subject of drugs but
he became entangled with a girl who worked
in a grocery store and he was also involved
in a lawsuit about some medical question so
he left lockport
look at the way it is written in just a matter
of fact way not nothing sentimental now the
idea is that dick and the background is that
dick and ah nicole they have been divorced
for quite a while they have been separated
or divorced they have gone their separate
ways and then what happened to dick as his
descent into ignominy begins from french riviera
being the toast of the town now he and once
upon a time hailed as a brilliant ah doctor
now he has reached a point where he had to
ultimately face a lawsuit about some medical
question and he has become like a rolling
stone that gathers no
also he has been going from here to there
without any success much success personally
or professionally ok but just a drifter but
without using the word drifter fitzgerald
gives us the portrait of a man ok who is well
past his greatness some of the works of fitzgerald
that you should know at least the title the
diamond as big as the ritz its a short story
tender is the night the great gatsby the beautiful
and damned the last tycoon tales of the jazz
age this side of paradise the crack up the
last tycoon was never completed hemingway
wanted to call it the love of the last tycoon
ok his notes for the novel were edited by
his friend edmund wilson and it was published
in nineteen forty one as the last tycoon but
then it was not completely written by fitzgerald
so thank you very much and we will be talking
about more american grades in our next class
