Set in London in 1594, ‘Tarquin of Cheapside’ is a cross between a whodunnit and a whodunwhat. We find Wessel Caxter reading ‘The Faerie Queen,’ before his evening is interrupted by a mysterious figure, known only as Soft Shoes. Soft Shoes is being pursued by Flowing Boots, but who they are and what their quarrel is, is only revealed after Soft Shoes completes a poem. Packed with literary flourishes and sharp wit, this offers a fascinating insight into the mind of a master at the start of his career. ‘Tarquin of Cheapside’ is perfect for fans of Debbie Young. F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940) is one of the greatest American novelists of the 20th century and the author of the classics ‘Tender is the Night’ and ‘The Great Gatsby’, with the latter having been made into a film starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Carey Mulligan. Skillfully capturing the prosperity of post-World War One America, his writing helped illustrate the 1920s Jazz Age that he and his wife Zelda Fitzgerald were at the centre of.
Evoking the Jazz-Age world that would later appear in his masterpiece, The Great Gatsby, this essential Fitzgerald collection contains some of the writer’s most famous and celebrated stories. In “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” an extraordinary child is born an old man, growing younger as the world ages around him. “The Diamond as Big as the Ritz,” a fable of excess and greed, shows two boarding school classmates mired in deception as they make their fortune in gemstones. And in the classic novella “May Day,” debutantes dance the night away as war veterans and socialists clash in the streets of New York. Opening the book is a playful and irreverent set of notes from the author, documenting the real-life pressures and experiences that shaped these stories, from his years at Princeton to his cravings for luxury to the May Day Riots of 1919. Taken as a whole, this collection brings to vivid life the dazzling excesses, stunning contrasts, and simmering unrest of a glittering era. Its 1922 publication furthered Fitzgerald's reputation as a master storyteller, and its legacy staked his place as the spokesman of an age.
Although better known today for his novels, in the 1920s F. Scott Fitzgerald ranked among the top writers of magazine fiction. Fitzgerald represented the dreams and aspirations of the post-World War I generation in his life as well as his works. With his glamorous wife, Zelda, and his cosmopolitan social circle, he projected the perfect image for narrating tales of restless youth in a hectic world. These short stories offer insights into many themes, characters, and techniques that emerged in Fitzgerald's later works. The title tale, "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," reflects his preoccupation with life's fleeting nature. "Winter Dreams," written three years before The Great Gatsby, shares the concept of commitment to an idealized dream. "Babes in the Woods," developed during the author's Princeton days, evidences the roots of This Side of Paradise. Thirteen other selections offer further insights into the author's growing skills as well as examples of his sparkling prose, understated wit, and deft characterizations.
At the outset of what he called "the greatest, the gaudiest spree in history," F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote the works that brought him instant fame, mastering the glittering aphoristic prose and keen social observation that would distinguish all his writing. This Library of America volume brings together four volumes that collectively offer the fullest literary expression of one of the most fascinating eras in American life. This Side of Paradise (1920) gave Fitzgerald the early success that defined and haunted him for the rest of his career. Offering in its Princeton chapters the most enduring portrait of college life in American literature, this lyrical novel records the ardent and often confused longings of its hero's struggles to find love and to formulate a philosophy of life. Flappers and Philosophers (1920), a collection of accomplished short stories, includes such classics as "Dalyrimple Goes Wrong," "Bernice Bobs Her Hair," and "The Ice Palace." Fitzgerald continues his dissection of a self-destructive era in his second novel, The Beautiful and Damned (1922), as the self-styled aristocrat Anthony Patch and his beautiful wife, Gloria, are cut off from an inheritance and forced to endure the excruciating dwindling of their fortune. Here New York City, playground for the pleasure-loving Patches and brutal mirror of their dissipation, is portrayed more vividly than anywhere else in Fitzgerald's work. Tales of the Jazz Age (1922), his second collection of stories, includes the novella "May Day," featuring interlocking tales of debutantes, soldiers, and socialists brought together in the uncertain aftermath of World War I, and "A Diamond as Big as the Ritz," a fable in which the excesses of the Jazz Age take the hallucinatory form of a palace of unfathomable opulence hidden deep in the Montana Rockies. LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation’s literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America’s best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.
Tales of the Jazz Age (1922) is a collection of eleven short stories by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Divided into three separate parts, according to subject matter, it includes one of his better-known short stories, "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button". All of the stories had been published earlier, independently, in either Metropolitan Magazine (New York), Saturday Evening Post, Smart Set, Collier's, Chicago Sunday Tribune, or Vanity Fair.
Includes "The Eyes of the Panther," Ambrose Bierce; "The Locket," Kate Chopin; "Out of Season," Ernest Hemingway; "The Black Cat," Edgar Allan Poe; "Luck," Mark Twain; "The Dilettante," Edith Wharton; more.
"Ideal for students and non-specialist general readers with an interest in the literary works of an iconic American author. Very highly recommended." ― The Midwest Book Review Although better known today for his novels, in the 1920s F. Scott Fitzgerald ranked among the top writers of magazine fiction. Fitzgerald represented the dreams and aspirations of the post-World War I generation in his life as well as his works. With his glamorous wife, Zelda, and cosmopolitan social circle, the gifted young wordsmith projected the perfect image for narrating tales of restless youth in a hectic world. These short stories offer insights into many themes, characters, and techniques that emerged in Fitzgerald's later works. "Winter Dreams," written three years before The Great Gatsby, shares the concept of commitment to an idealized dream. "Babes in the Woods," developed while the author was still a student at Princeton, evidences the roots of This Side of Paradise. A dozen other selections ― including "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," "The Camel's Back," "The Four Fists," and "The Cut-Glass Bowl" ― offer further insights into the author's growing skills as well as individual examples of his sparkling prose, understated wit, and deft characterizations.
"A generation grown up to find all Gods dead, all wars fought, all faiths in man shaken", was how F. Scott Fitzgerald defined his age. Perhaps nowhere in American fiction is this statement better exemplified than in Fitzgerald's first two volumes of short fiction: Flappers and Philosophers and Tales of the Jazz Age. Penguin's new Jazz Age Stories gathers all of these early pieces in one volume, which together capture the shine and seductive sound of early American jazz, the scandalous affronts to religious pieties, the nights of drunken revelry, and the impending doom of financial, moral, and intellectual dissolution. Spanning the early twentieth-century American landscape -- the Minnesota of his youth, the Princeton college years, the squalor and opulence of New York -- this collection contains unforgettable images of modern America, and eloquently expresses Fitzgerald's theme of the enchantment and disillusionment of materialism. Jazz Age Stories includes "The Ice Palace", "Bernice Bobs Her Hair", and "A Diamond as Big as The Ritz".
'I tender these tales of the Jazz Age into the hands of those who read as they run and run as they read.' Tales of the Jazz Age (1922) was Fitzgerald's second collection of short stories, and it contains some of the best examples of his talent as a writer of short fiction. Often overshadowed by his major novels, Fitzgerald's short stories demonstrate the same originality and inventive range, as he chronicles with wry and astute observation the temper of the hedonistic 1920s. In 'May Day' and 'The Diamond as Big as the Ritz', two of his greatest stories, he conjures up the spirit of the age; in other stories he adopts a variety of forms - parody, a one-act play, fantasy - with unrivalled versatility. 'The Curious Case of Benjamin Button', a tale of a man living his life backwards, features among the 'Fantasies' in Fitzgerald's self-deprecatory Table of Contents, alongside the groupings 'My Last Flappers' and 'Unclassified Masterpieces'. Fitzgerald chose the stories for his second collection when he was just twenty-five years old, and in the full flush of wild literary success. Tales of the Jazz Age is a quirky, electrifying selection reaching back into his college days, showing Fitzgerald's strengths not only as one of America's leading short story authors in the early 1920s, but as a playwright, farcical satirist, melodramatist, and fantastical novella-writer. He went in all these directions with equal ease and flash in 1922. Tales of the Jazz Age was a sensation then, and remains so now. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.
The Great Gatsby and its criticism of American society during the 1920s, F. Scott Fitzgerald claimed the distinction of writing what many consider to be the "great American novel." Critical Companion to F.
