The Beautiful and Damned: by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Paperback
Please select the version of book you would like to purchase.
ISBN13: 9791043143557
Publisher: Culturea
Published: Mar 16 2026
Pages: 484
Weight: 1.26
Height: 1.08 Width: 5.83 Depth: 8.27
Language: English
Publisher: Culturea
Published: Mar 16 2026
Pages: 484
Weight: 1.26
Height: 1.08 Width: 5.83 Depth: 8.27
Language: English
Anthony Patch, the grandson of a wealthy businessman, spends his youth in idle relaxation expecting to inherit his grandfather's fortune. But when he meets Gloria, a vibrant young flapper, the two feel an irresistible attraction and quickly get married despite their clashing personalities.The two embark on a lifestyle of Jazz Age living: hard partying, profligate spending, and generally living the high life. But Anthony's prohibitionist grandfather soon finds out and disowns Anthony, sending their lifestyle crashing down from its former heights to intolerable indignity.Like Fitzgerald's previous novel, This Side of Paradise, and his next novel, The Great Gatsby, The Beautiful and Damned documents the life of the idle rich in America's Jazz Age. Both Anthony and Gloria's characters explore the problem of what one is left to do when one has no other purpose in life. Because Anthony's expecting a large inheritance, his ambition is muzzled and he feels no need to embark on a career or participate in the betterment of society. Gloria's main purpose in life was to find a husband; once she's done that, what's left except spending money and partying?The relationship between Anthony and Gloria is the explosive propellant that drives the plot. The two are clearly a poor match for each other. While Anthony is an aimless aesthete who expects to inherit wealth and power, Gloria is a self-absorbed socialite mostly banking on her undisputed beauty. Their mutual selfishness leads to constant conflict, and eventually, to mutual dislike. But despite that, the two remain together, locked in to their self-absorption, lack of ambition, and obsession with the past, as Anthony descends into alcoholism and Gloria into desperate middle age.Anthony and Gloria are fairly transparent fictionalizations of Fitzgerald himself and his wife Zelda. Their relationship was famously tumultuous, and parallels Anthony and Gloria's highs and lows. Fitzgerald himself was born to upper-middle-class wealth a
Also in
Classic Fiction
James Fenimore Cooper: The Leatherstocking Tales Vol. 1 (Loa #26): The Pioneers / The Last of the Mohicans / The Prairie
Cooper, James Fenimore
Hardcover
From $19.99
Four Comedies: The Taming of the Shrew, a Midsummer Night's Dream, the Merchant of Venice, Twelfth Night
Shakespeare, William
Paperback
From $5.99
Before Gatsby: The First Twenty-Six Stories
Bruccoli, Matthew J.
Baughman, Judith
Fitzgerald, F. Scott
Paperback
$50.74
The Princess Bride Deluxe Limited Edition: S. Morgenstern's Classic Tale of True Love and High Adventure
Goldman, William
Paperback
$19.80
The Fellowship of the Ring: Being the First Part of the Lord of the Rings
Tolkien, J. R. R.
Paperback
$17.99
The Lord of the Rings Illustrated by the Author: Illustrated by J.R.R. Tolkien
Tolkien, J. R. R.
Hardcover
$81.00
The Princess Bride: S. Morgenstern's Classic Tale of True Love and High Adventure
Goldman, William
Hardcover
$38.00
The Pilgrim's Progress: A Readable Modern-Day Version of John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress (Revised and easy-to-read)
Vermilye, Alan
Bunyan, John
Paperback
$15.19
Frankenstein, Dracula, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Stoker, Bram
Shelley, Mary
Stevenson, Robert Louis
Paperback
$9.45
