Nathanael73's Full Review: F. Scott Fitzgerald and Sharon G. Carson - This Si...
This Side Of Paradise, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s debut novel, has undeservedly been kept in the shadows by later works such as The Great Gatsby and Tender Is The Night. Fitzgerald composed most of This Side Of Paradise while a student at Princeton, including fragments of poetry, drama and letters within the text. This heavily autobiographical novel was published when Fitzgerald was just 23 and met with great critical acclaim and commercial success.
Fitzgerald’s protagonist, Amory Blaine, is an only child from a wealthy Minnesotan family. Amory’s father owns a large mansion and estate on Lake Geneva, and has a considerable fortune invested in railroad and streetcar stocks. This Side Of Paradise follows Amory from his childhood in Minneapolis through to his adulthood in New York City, with stops at Preparatory School and Princeton along the way.
Unequal amounts of time are devoted to each stage of Amory’s development. Considerable time is devoted to Amory’s life at St. Regis’s and Princeton, while his two years spent in France (1917-1919) serving in the First World War are almost totally ignored. In a book that is so thoroughly concerned with the development of it’s central character, it seemed very odd that such a life-altering event as the Great War should be glossed over.
This Side Of Paradise is a Romantic novel in the sense that it focuses on the individual above all else, and is concerned with the issues of ego, vanity, intellect, creation, education, rebellion and class. Amory is portrayed at times as a Byronic Hero, and indeed Byron’s Manfred is referred to on several occasions. Amory and his friends discuss many Romantic poets and writers, such as Keats, Byron and Shelley.
Fitzgerald brilliantly captures the yearning of youth for immortality. Reading This Side Of Paradise reminded me of my High School and University days, of many, many late-night conversations in which my friends and I predicted our future successes and the failures of our enemies. I am sure that almost all readers will relate to this aspect of the book. Amory believes that he is destined for greatness and that the world lays prostrate before him.
Amory achieves an impressive level of popularity and success at Princeton, yet loses his prestige after failing a math class due to laziness. Like Fitzgerald himself, Amory chooses to go to war rather than complete his education. After the war Amory takes an apartment in NYC with his Princeton poet pal Tom D’Invilliers and lands a copywriting job at an advertising agency which he later quits due to boredom and disenchantment with capitalism.
Over the years Amory has been involved with various young women, all from rich families, but it is not until he meets Rosalind, the sister of another Princeton pal, that he really falls in love. Amory is now in his early twenties, his parents have passed away, and he finds that his inheritance is not what it should have been due to bad investments by his father. His lack of a fortune leads to a break-up with Rosalind. It is this event that in many ways signals the end of youth and dreams. Amory must now make his way in the world without the privilege of wealth or the luxury of love.
The final segment of the novel finds Amory achieving self-knowledge. He returns to the Princeton campus, the scene of his greatest triumphs, and in the novels penultimate line proclaims, “I know myself ... but that is all.”
This Side Of Paradise contains many universal themes and will appeal to both the young and young-at-heart. Fitzgerald penned many, many memorable lines and wonderful descriptions. At times his wit reaches the same heights as Oscar Wilde’s. Fitzgerald also succeeds in capturing the nuances of a time and place. Readers who have enjoyed such books as Joyce’s A Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man and Salinger’s Catcher In The Rye will find much to love in This Side Of Paradise.
The story of the privileged, aimless and self-absorbed Amory Blaine and his journey from prep school to Princeton to the First World War is an exubera...More at Buy.com Marketplaces
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