Flappers and Philosophers

F. Scott FitzgeraldProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

4.0

Word count: 347K words
Chapters: 35

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Flappers and Philosophers by F. Scott FitzgeraldAuthor: Fitzgerald, F. Scott (Francis Scott), 1896-1940,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: Aug 1, 2003

Editor's review

Flappers and Philosophers is an early short story collection by F. Scott Fitzgerald, released free of charge in its original English by Project Gutenberg. The collection includes several stories centered on young men and women of the Jazz Age, exploring love, marriage, desire, and disillusionment in social settings. The prose is light and ironic, revealing early versions of themes that recur in Fitzgerald's later novels. The stories are short and focused in setting, suitable for reading in segments on a commute or before bed, and also as an introduction to early twentieth-century American social manners and short narrative style. Note that some stories carry the limitations of the social attitudes and expressions of their time, and readers should understand them in historical context. Overall, it is better suited to readers interested in Fitzgerald's development and Jazz Age literature than to those seeking deep social critique or complex novelistic structure.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers interested in Fitzgerald's early work and Jazz Age literature
Readers who like short stories and want to read in fragmented time
Readers studying early twentieth-century American social manners and youth culture
Those who need public-domain English texts as supplementary reading or teaching material
Readers who appreciate a light, ironic tone and urban romance themes

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting the complete novelistic structure of The Great Gatsby
Readers who prefer deep social critique or weighty historical subjects
Beginners unaccustomed to reading in English or to early twentieth-century narrative cadence
Readers uninterested in romance and social themes

Reading tips

Read in the order of the pieces and note the recurring topics of young love, marriage, and class.
After each story, briefly note the characters' situations and the ending's turn, to appreciate Fitzgerald's short-story structure.
Read alongside background material on Jazz Age society to understand the fashion and social details in the stories.
If reading in English is difficult, first use a Chinese translation to follow the plot, then return to the original to appreciate the language.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

How is this book related to The Great Gatsby?

This is an early short story collection by Fitzgerald, sharing the Jazz Age milieu of The Great Gatsby, with continuities in themes of love, class, and disillusionment, but it is an independent collection of short stories, not a predecessor or sequel to the novel.

What English level is needed to read this book?

The text is the original English, with vocabulary and sentence patterns characteristic of the early twentieth century. Intermediate English reading ability or above is recommended, or use annotations and translations as support so that period cadence does not hinder the reading experience.

Is this book suitable as classroom teaching material?

It can serve as supplementary reading for American short fiction, Jazz Age literature, or studies of Fitzgerald's writing. Some pieces carry attitudes and expressions limited by their era, so teachers should explain them in historical context.

What are the features of the Project Gutenberg edition?

This edition is a free public-domain ebook, easy to obtain, with text based on the original work that has entered the public domain. It usually lacks a modern introduction or detailed notes, so readers must supply biographical and historical background independently.

Comments

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About the author

F. Scott Fitzgerald Author · American · 1896–1940

F. Scott Fitzgerald (Francis Scott Fitzgerald, 1896–1940) was an American novelist, born in St. Paul, Minnesota, who attended Princeton University but left before graduating. In 1920 he rose to fame with This Side of Paradise, and went on to publish The Beautiful and Damned, Tales of the Jazz Age, and Flappers and Philosophers. His writing often takes as its setting the social life of upper-class America after the First World War; its style is at once brilliant and soberly disillusioned, and it excels at capturing the sense of loss behind youth, wealth, and love, which has made him an important figure in twentieth-century American literature. He died of heart disease in Los Angeles in 1940.