This Side of Paradise - Francis Scott Fitzgerald

This Side of Paradise – Francis Scott Fitzgerald – F. Scott Fitzgeralds cherished debut novel announced the arrival of a brilliant young writer and anticipated his masterpiece, The Great Gatsby. Published in 1920, when the author was just twenty-three, This Side of Paradise recounts the education of young Amory Blaineegoistic, versatile, callow, imaginative. As Amory makes his way among debutantes and Princeton undergraduates, we enter an environment heady with the promise of everything that was new in the vigorous, restless America after World War I. We experience Amorys sailing hopes, crushing defeats, deep loves and stubborn losses. His growth from self-absorption to sexual awareness and personhood unfolds with continuous improvisatory energy and delight. Fitzgeralds remarkable formal inventiveness couches Amorys narrative among songs, poems, dramatic dialogue, questions and answers. The novels freshness and vervepraised upon publication, now renowned by historyonly heighten the sense that the world being described is our own, modern world.Published in 1920, and taking its title from a line of the Rupert Brooke poem Tiare Tahiti, the book examines the lives and morality of post-World War I youth. Its protagonist, Amory Blaine, is an attractive Princeton University student who dabbles in literature. The novel explores the theme of love warped by greed and status-seeking.