Even the American Heritage Dictionary acknowledges that F. Scott Fitzgerald "epitomized the Jazz Age." And nowhere among his writings are the gin, pith, and morning-after squint of that era better illuminated than in these short essays. Selected in celebration of the 100th anniversary of Fitzgerald's birth, these candid personal memoirs—one written with his wife, Zelda—furnish nothing less than the autobiography of "the lost generation" of the 1920s. "He lacked armor," E.L. Doctorow, author of The Waterworks, Ragtime, and Billy Bathgate, notes in his introduction. "He did not live in protective seclusion, as Faulkner. He was not carapaced in self-presentation, as Hemingway. He jumped right into the foolish heart of everything, as he had into the Plaza fountain." The Jazz Age is a celebration of one of the twentieth century's most vital writers.
Reviews
Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly
Commemorating the 100th anniversary of his birth, these essays present a middle-aged Fitzgerald looking back on the era he came to epitomize. (Sept.)
Library Journal
With September 24 marking what would have been Fitzgerald's 100th birthday, it is fitting that a book bearing his name and entitled The Jazz Age should emerge, for the two are inseparable in the minds of the reading public. This book of five confessional essays from the 1930s follows Scott and Zelda from the height of their celebrity as the darlings of the 1920s to years of rapid decline leading to the self-proclaimed "Crack Up" in 1936. The poetics of Fitzgerald's style are not lost in nonfiction, and these pieces display some of his finest writing. This volume contains an introduction by E.L. Doctorow.