The Beautiful and Damned
New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1922. Hill, W.E. 2nd Printing. Hard Cover. Very Good / No Jacket. Item #2345278
First state of second printing (Bruccoli A8.I.b1). Lacks scarce jacket. Flap from absent jacket laid in, a few small blemishes on boards, gilt titles on spine are much brighter than we normally see.
449, [1] pp. 8vo. Fitzgerald's second novel, published just two years after his debut, This Side of Paradise. "The Beautiful and Damned is the story of Anthony Patch and his wife, Gloria. Harvard-educated and an aspiring aesthete, Patch is waiting for his inheritance upon his grandfather's death. His reckless marriage to Gloria is fueled by alcohol and is destroyed by greed. The Patches race through a series of alcohol-induced fiascoes -- first in hilarity, and then in despair. The Beautiful and Damned, a devastating portrait of the nouveaux riches, New York night life, reckless ambition, and squandered talent, was published in 1922 on the heels of Fitzgerald's first novel. It signaled his maturity as a storyteller and, more important, as a novelist."
Price: $275.00