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The Era of Uncertainty: the early 1920s was characterized with a great deal of uncertainty and ambivalence toward their own safety, as Wilson intended to guide America with war leadership rather than their isolationism immediately after WWI. They saw international relations as threatening to their safety; as a result of this panic, the majority adopted the ideology of romantic cynicismF. Scott Fitzgerald became pioneer of such an idea of youth. The Great Gatsby implements this with Daisy predicament in choosing between Tom or Gatsby. Her persona itself conceals her struggles and she outwardly portrays a happy personality
-economic boom: the immediate effect of WWI was a substantial economic boom and all were spending extravagantly off credit; bootlegging also developed.—Gatsby’s wealth came from bootlegging and the celebratory setting with Gatsby’s parties reflect the predominant attitude of that time period. The guests described at Gatsby’s parties are shown as naïve and oblivious to the issue of overwhelming debt that accumulated from overspending.
Fitzgerald’s Background: creator of an era of youthfulness in the early 1920s; coined “jazz age,” one of the first writers to draw attention to the new postwar sophistication and also introduced the phenomenon of youthful love affairs and parties
-Fitzgerald was an alcoholic since he was a teenager. His alcoholism conflicted with his relationship with people.
-Had financial issues due to paying for Zelda’s medical bills (Schizophrenia) and distraction from working on his novels (Hemingway had a close relationship with Fitzgerald and believed that Zelda influenced her husband to keep drinking as to distract him from working on his novels).
-Fitzgerald suffered tuberculosis: no one took his conditions seriously; they focused more on his drinking habit. An example would be when Fitzgerald and his lover, Sheilah Graham, had trouble leaving the theatre because Fitzgerald was experiencing dizziness; upset, he asks Graham “They think I’m drunk, don’t they?”
-He died at the age of 44 on December 21, 1940 from a heart attack.
-At his funeral, an attendant named Dorothy Parker constantly murmured a line from The Great Gatsby, “that poor son-of-a bitch”.
-interesting fact: Fitzgerald was never satisfied with the title, The Great Gatsby, he intended to change it, but it was too late for it was already published and it stuck. The Love of the Last Tycoon was Fitzgerald’s last unfinished book he wrote before he died. Originally, it was published as The Last Tycoon, but Fitzgerald preferred having it called as The Love of the Last Tycoon.
-Zelda, his wife, was like Fitzgerald’s partner in crime; they played unusual antics together in the public—analogous to the persona of Daisy
-she lived in mental institutions on the east coast and tried writing a novel based on her relationship with Fitzgerald, called, Save Me the Waltz. Fitzgerald had a negative reaction to her book and told her doctors to forbid her from writing novels because he claims their relationship is one of his “materials” for his novels.
Women’s Role in the 1920s: Women began to grow more independent and fought for the same rights as men.
Flappers: Many of the young women in the 1920s desired to have fun. Smoking, drinking, and sexual experimentations were characteristics of a flapper. Most held steady jobs but at night, flappers normally attend jazz clubs and vaudeville shows. But the common place most flappers go to would be the speakeasies (unlicensed saloons). New women of the twenties adopted the same carefree attitude as men towards prohibition.
Flappers were not conservative. They danced provocatively, smoked cigarettes, drank alcohol in public, and dated freely. -In the political agenda, many wondered if flappers were expressing themselves or acting like men.