houseofatreides 's review for:

The Beautiful and Damned by F. Scott Fitzgerald
3.25
emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
The Beautiful and The Damned follows the story of Anthony Patch and his eventual wife Gloria. They live the 1910s up in glamour in high fashion and fast and easy as a leisurely class, often drinking the days away. The story follows the nihilism of this class, of the attitudes that nothing matters and that in a sense ‘God is dead’.
Anthony Patch is waiting to inherit money from his rich Grandfather. He gets by from his ‘trustfund’. Throughout the novel he takes no interest in improving his well being or ‘working’ for a better life but living a life of ease and in latter half depravity and drunkenness. Eventually his grandfather after witnessing a horrific display of such-he’s a Prohibitionist cuts Anthony and Gloria out of the Will. After he dies Anthony brings a lawsuit contesting the will. His friends are almost all cynics towards life and it’s meaning. But some like Dick, work towards their hopes by putting in effort and even his friend Maury does eventually. In the end the novel is a tragedy of the rich and ultra rich how a life of everything leads to nothing, and how life matters in some ways. The ending ends after ww1 and prohibition with Anthony gaining $30million. However in the process he lost his mind and friends do to alcoholism and his high baller life. Gloria in the same pace, still maintained her beauty but lost her innocence and became forlorn and bitter towards her husbands life. Both characters lived lives of ruin and hatred towards each other, never holding a firm care in the world except for their lifestyle. The novel and the characters are a stark reminder of how wealth can corrupt and how the high class often is full of murky underline of issues. although I would not say Gloria became ugly, she aged as all people do and lost her beauty as a young woman. Anthony had succumbed to alcoholism and was implied to be mentally unstable and even wheelchair bound.  In the end he implied he was owed the wealth thru just existing.
overall a interesting look on the lives of the rich and how money changes them and how they feel owed. Gloria and Anthony both could care less for the world and it’s going ons prescribing they are above it all, and even mocking the concept of God. At one point Maury monologues of such. God is seen as a afterthought to them. Coming in the form of Biphilism it Gloria. The characters are cruel in their uncaring actions and thoughts towards others, often scoffing at those such as Richard who expounded upon his wealth by making something of himself thru writing. Or Joseph Blocekman.