The Great Gatsby Is Turning 100 This Year

All the way back in April 1925, a young author named Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald published his third novel. Already something of a critical and commercial success, Fitzgerald might have felt there was something different about this novel—that this was going to be the one that pushed him one step further, and placed him among the greats of American literature.

This novel was, of course, The Great Gatsby. And even in his most optimistic mood, F. Scott Fitzgerald could not have imagined the lasting impact his work would have.

As we celebrate the 100th anniversary of The Great Gatsby, it’s time to reflect on that impact and learn more about the novel that many believe to be Fitzgerald’s finest.

How The Great Gatsby Came to Be

While the novel is not strictly autobiographical, there are elements of its author in the text. As a teenager, Fitzgerald attended the prestigious Princeton University, where he met the young socialist Ginevra King. Ginevra’s family did not approve of her involvement with someone of Fitzgerald’s lowly social standing, and so the romance was doomed to failure. The character of Daisy Buchanan in the novel would be inspired by Ginevra.

Events of the day also worked their way into the narrative. The Hall-Mills double murder case of 1922 caught the attention of the newspaper-buying public, and certain details of the gruesome case may have inspired Fitzgerald’s writing.

Much of this writing took place in Great Neck, New York, where F. Scott Fitzgerald and his wife Zelda were living at the time. The tension between the nouveau riche and old money in Great Neck certainly inspired the West Egg and East Egg friction of the novel, while the eponymous Jay Gatsby was inspired in part by the Fitzgeralds’ neighbor, bootlegger Max Gerlach.

A Slow-Burning Literary Classic

Before The Great Gatsby was complete, the Fitzgeralds left the United States for Europe. The couple’s time in Europe was not a happy one. On the French Riviera, accusations of infidelity led to Zelda overdosing on sleeping pills, which almost cost her her life. In Rome, Fitzgerald was severely beaten after assaulting a police officer in a drunken brawl.

Despite this turmoil, the novel was indeed completed and was finally released in April 1925. Fitzgerald’s literary peers, including Willa Cather, T.S. Eliot, and Edith Wharton, heralded its genius, but the general public seemed not to agree. The novel sold poorly—Fitzgerald’s celebrity having waned somewhat in the three years since his last book—and was a commercial failure..

Tragically, The Great Gatsby never got the attention it deserved during Fitzgerald’s lifetime.

Drained by the experience, it took him nine years to pen another novel—1934’s Tender is the Night. The author died in 1940, aged only 44, believing his literary career to have been a failure.

Interpreting The Great Gatsby Today

We know now that Fitzgerald was anything but a failure. Both The Great Gatsby and Tender Is the Night are now broadly known as literary classics, and candidates for the elusive title of “Great American Novel.” It’s a tragedy that Fitzgerald would never know just how much of a success he was going to become in the decades that followed his untimely passing.

So, just why has the novel become so successful? It’s undoubtedly entertaining and is a masterpiece of literary creativity and storytelling. But perhaps there is a deeper reason—perhaps it’s because there is so much richness and nuance in its underlying meaning.

Part of the lasting legacy of The Great Gatsby lies in its exploration of characters inhabiting a precarious and largely false environment. Rather than being a celebration of gaudy wealth and superficial materialism, the novel presents this as a problematic reality of our world, which must somehow be overcome.

Or does it? That’s not how everyone sees the novel. Some view The Great Gatsby as championing the power of the individual, an example of how adversity can be defeated and class boundaries can be traversed. Looking at it in this way, the novel’s characters become emblematic of the broader American dream.

It seems Fitzgerald had the former in mind when he wrote the book. After all, he left Great Neck, New York, after becoming disgusted with the ostentatious parties and obscene displays of wealth. But the ambiguity of the novel and the imperfections of its characters leave the narrative open to interpretation—one of the work’s undeniable strengths.

The Great Gatsby, 100 Years On

No matter how you personally interpret The Great Gatsby, few would deny the novel its place among the pantheon of great works in the English language. F. Scott Fitzgerald was not completely unappreciated in his lifetime; his first two novels sold impressively, and the author was welcomed into the Parisian circle of Hemingway and Gertrude Stein in the years after The Great Gatsby’s publication – but he did not achieve the acclaim his legacy has since enjoyed.

This is undoubtedly a tragedy, particularly when we consider how young Fitzgerald was when he died. Still, we can take comfort in the astonishing achievements of his short career and in his lasting impact on the literary landscape.