The Beautiful and Damned

by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Overview

Set in the years leading up to and just after World War I, The Beautiful and Damned explores the American upper class during a time of social and economic change. It's a novel deeply embedded in the cultural fabric of the Jazz Age—a term Fitzgerald himself popularized. This was an era of postwar disillusionment, moral reevaluation, and rapidly shifting values, particularly among the elite youth.

The novel is partly autobiographical and reflects Fitzgerald's own early years with his wife, Zelda Sayre. Like the main characters, Fitzgerald and Zelda lived lavishly on uncertain financial footing, seeking to reconcile artistic ambition with societal expectations and personal indulgence.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940184642949
Publisher:	F. Scott Fitzgerald
Publication date:	04/11/2025
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	628 KB

About the Author

Fitzgerald was born into a family that straddled the line between social aspiration and financial insecurity. His father, Edward Fitzgerald, came from a once-wealthy Maryland family, while his mother, Mary McQuillan, was the daughter of an Irish immigrant who made a small fortune in the wholesale grocery business.

From an early age, Fitzgerald was fascinated by status, beauty, and wealth—all themes that would dominate his literary work. He was named after his distant relative Francis Scott Key, the lyricist of "The Star-Spangled Banner."

Fitzgerald attended Princeton University starting in 1913 but never graduated. He was more devoted to writing and student theater than to academics. While at Princeton, he began crafting the image of the writer he would become—glamorous, ambitious, socially attuned, but always at odds with the establishment.

He left Princeton in 1917 to join the U.S. Army during World War I, fearing he might die before achieving literary fame. He never saw combat, but during his military service in Alabama, he met Zelda Sayre, who would become his wife and his muse.

Date of Birth:

September 24, 1896

Date of Death:

December 21, 1940

Place of Birth:

St. Paul, Minnesota

Education:

Princeton University

Editorial Reviews

Chicago Daily News (March 15, 1922)​
Harry Hansen lauded the novel as "a whale of a book" and predicted that Fitzgerald would become "one of the major novelists of our own time."

Chicago Daily News (March 15, 1922)? - N/A