The present paper tries to capture the very essence of the 20th century in Fitzgerald’s universe of fiction, mainly the short one.
The first chapter, “20th Century American Short Fiction”, picks up three of the best short story writers of the 20th century and their career as professional writers. The aim was to reveal the way the relationship between the reader and the text establishes, how the text is received and what the reader brings to the reading.
The second chapter, “The Modern World as Reflected in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Short Stories”, introduces the rich context of the Jazz Age (a name Fitzgerald himself invented), a period of wild economic prosperity, cultural flowering and a shaking up of social mores. It was also the defining era of Fitzgerald’s life as a writer with jazz playing a significant part in wider cultural changes. Subsections 2.2 to 2.4 are dedicated to the best part of Fitzgerald’s career as a writer of most remarkable tales.
The final chapter, “Themes in and Critical Views of Fitzgerald’s Most Popular Short Stories”, closes the research with the analysis of the main themes and critical views about this category of Fitzgerald’s fiction, with a particular focus on my own vision on "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button", in fact a paper that I presented at a round table named “Literature and life Critical Chatting: F. S. Fitzgerald’s “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”; H. Melville’s “Bartleby, the Scrivener. A Story of Wall Street”, at the Students’ Scientific Session on 27 May 2015, organized by the Faculty of Letters.
Table of Contents
Argument
Paper Presentation
Chapter I: 20th Century American Short Fiction
1.1 Most popular American short story writers
1.1.1 Ernest Hemingway
1.1.2 F. Scott Fitzgerald
1.1.3 Stephen King
1.2 Short stories. From writing to reading
1.3 Tips and tricks on how to write short fiction
Chapter II: The Modern World as Reflected in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Short Stories
2.1 Living in the Jazz Age
2.2 “Tales of the Jazz Age” (1922)
2.2.1 “The Camel’s Back”
2.2.2 “May Day”
2.3 “Flappers and Philosophers” (1920)
2.3.1 “Bernice Bobs Her Hair”
2.4 “All the Sad Young Men” (1926)
2.4.1 “Winter Dreams”
Chapter III: Themes in and Critical views of Fitzgerald’s Most Popular Short Stories
3.1 Critical views
3.2 Themes
3.3 Critical chatting: “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”
Research Objectives and Themes
This dissertation examines the literary craftsmanship and thematic depth of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s short stories, aiming to demonstrate how he captured the essence of the Jazz Age and the nuances of the American Dream through his narrative techniques and character studies.
- Analysis of Fitzgerald as a representative writer of 20th-century American fiction.
- Exploration of historical and social contexts defining the Jazz Age.
- Examination of recurrent themes such as wealth, social status, and family relationships.
- Study of the "modern heroine" and the psychological impact of time and aging in his narratives.
Extract from the Book
3.3 Critical chatting: “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” (1922)
This is a story about Benjamin Button, an infant who is born as a seventy-year-old man and ages in reveres. Set in the near time of the Civil War, when Benjamin is born, his father and mother have a hard time accepting his condition, forcing Benjamin to act his literal age. However, Benjamin acts and thinks like an older man, wanting to dress in a suit and smoke a cigar. After failing to integrate into school, eventually Benjamin begins to notice that he is looking younger. His skin is tightening up and his energy level is increasing. Soon, Benjamin and his father, almost similar in appearance in terms of age, attend a party and he is introduced to a young woman named Hildegard. The couple soon marries despite Benjamin looking nearly twenty years older than Hildegard. After fathering a child, Benjamin continues to grow younger. He begins to notice that his interests in the party lifestyle are growing, while his interests in his wife are decreasing. After serving in the army Benjamin enters college and graduates from Harvard. Meanwhile his son, Roscoe, has inherited the family hardware business. However, even Roscoe is embarrassed to be seen with Benjamin because of how young he looks. And in the end, after Benjamin attends kindergarten with his own grandchild, he continues to become younger and younger until his mind starts to blank out, resetting back to an infantile status.
Summary of Chapters
Chapter I: 20th Century American Short Fiction: Provides an overview of prominent American short story writers and discusses the general transition from writing to reading short fiction.
Chapter II: The Modern World as Reflected in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Short Stories: contextualizes Fitzgerald's work within the cultural movement of the Jazz Age and provides analysis of specific collections and stories like The Camel’s Back and May Day.
Chapter III: Themes in and Critical views of Fitzgerald’s Most Popular Short Stories: Analyzes the recurring thematic motifs of wealth, family, alcohol, and the loss of youth, while providing a critical interpretation of the short story The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
Keywords
F. Scott Fitzgerald, Jazz Age, American Dream, Short Fiction, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Bernice Bobs Her Hair, Winter Dreams, American Literature, Modernism, Social Mores, Narrative Strategy, Lost Generation, Wealth, Alcoholism, Literary Criticism
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the core focus of this dissertation?
The work focuses on analyzing the thematic elements and narrative strategies in F. Scott Fitzgerald's short stories to understand how they reflect the American society of the 1920s.
What are the primary themes discussed in the paper?
The paper explores themes such as wealth and social status, family relationships, the impact of war, the modern heroine archetype, and the fear of aging and the loss of youth.
What is the author's primary research goal?
The primary goal is to demonstrate how Fitzgerald's short stories, often viewed as secondary to his novels, uniquely capture the "jazzy" essence of post-WWI America and the failures of the American Dream.
Which scientific methodology is employed?
The author uses a literary analysis approach, involving critical review of primary texts and comparing them with contemporary critical views and historical context of the Jazz Age.
What is covered in the main section of the dissertation?
The main section covers an analysis of major short story collections, specific case studies like "The Camel’s Back" and "Winter Dreams," and a critical examination of recurring motifs across Fitzgerald’s career.
Which keywords best characterize this work?
Key terms include F. Scott Fitzgerald, Jazz Age, Short Fiction, American Dream, and themes of wealth, youth, and identity.
How does the author interpret "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button"?
The author interprets the story not merely as fantasy, but as a social critique on the rigidity of societal norms and the human struggle against time, treating the protagonist's condition as an embarrassing social problem.
What significance does the author assign to the Jazz Age?
The author considers the Jazz Age as a defining cultural movement that Fitzgerald himself helped shape, characterized by economic prosperity, cultural flowering, and the shifting of social mores.
- Citar trabajo
- Danaila Costin (Autor), 2015, F. Scott Fitzgerald and the Jazz Age. Themes and Strategies in his Short Stories, Múnich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/323386
