Mr. Fitzgerald
Friday, March 09, 2007
Mr. Fitzgerald
"You don't write because you want to say something, you write because you have something to say."
If you are alive right now Mr. Fitzgerald, I'd like to meet you face to face. If your heart hadn't failed on you sixty odd years ago while halfway through you last book The Last Tycoon, you would've finished the book and write so many more brilliant literature worthy of generations after generations of readers. But you left behind merely this handful of work, and though I cannot say that it isn't adequate. I'm just saying that it'd be nice to have a lot more.
"It takes a genius to whine appealingly."
The very first book that I picked up of yours was The Great Gatsby, sometime in the beginning of last year, and I remember falling in love with your beautiful style of writing. It has affected my own style of writing ever since, and I don't particularly remember any other authors, living or dead, influencing me so much in terms of the writing style other than yourself. It'd be blasphemy of sorts to say that my writing style is modeled after you, because I am sure they are nowhere near your brilliance and greatness. However, I do try my very best to live up to you, and I hope to write as great as you, Mr. Fitzgerald.
"Show me a hero and I'll write you a tragedy."
I am currently reading the last of your five major works, Tender Is The Night. And so far, it has been a really good read. The thing I like about your writing is that it is smooth as it is deep. The way the sentences flowed with one another, felt like a drop of red ink into a cup of milk, and skimming my eyes over the words felt like brushing the tips of my fingers over a pure silk suit. The truth is, there are authors out there with a great story, but haven't the ability to express them in a comfortable, soothing manner to me. While there are authors out there with a brilliant writing style, but always revolving around the same plot and materials.
"No such thing as a man willing to be honest - that would be like a blind man willing to see."
And as for you, Mr. Fitzgerald, you seem to be the master of both areas. I've just read John Updike's "Rabbit, Run", and as much as I appreciated his writing style, the way the scenery and the characters felt like they were crawling out from the pages, I didn't particularly like his style of writing. Thus, I found myself jumping a couple of paragraphs towards the end of the book, wanting it to end as soon as possible. Of course, your book laid at the end of that one, and that was the perfect reason - or excuse - to skip those paragraphs.
"Genius goes around the world in its youth incessantly apologizing for having large feet. What wonder that later in life it should be inclined to raise those feet too swiftly to fools and bores."
Once in a while, people come up to you and ask about a time in the past century you would like to visit if you have the ability to time travel. I've always told them that I want to go back to the Jazz Age, or the 1920s. I have no idea why actually. Perhaps I've always harbored the hope that somewhere in New York, I might bump into somebody who knows somebody who knows somebody who knows Jay Gatsby. Or even, if I am lucky enough, I might meet Jay Gatsby itself! What a treat!
"An author ought to write for the youth of his own generation, the critics of the next, and the schoolmaster of ever afterwards."
But truth to be told, I think the greatness of Jay Gatsby, to me, wasn't because of his tragic romance but because of what he went through, and how that reflected myself in reality. To look for Jay Gatsby for me would be as easy as looking into the mirror at times, without the fancy parties and the exquisite house to accompany the image but, that is as close as I can get I guess. Nonetheless, I have always respected your works afterwards, even if they do not particularly suit my brand of tea(This Side of Paradise, for example). By the way, The Beautiful and Damned is horribly under-rated. You might want to rise from your grave and protest about it.
"The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function."
All and all, you are a great writer missing from the world, and it is such a pity that we do not have a writer such as yourself, with the ability to write with the utmost depth with the purest simplicity and style. I swear, all the beauty in Jay Gatsby can be found in your words alone, and nobody can replace that brilliance of yours, even if they manage to come close in the years to come. On par, yes. But never be replaced. You are dearly missed Mr. Fitzgerald, and very much so.
"In a real dark night of the soul, it is always three o'clock in the morning, day after day."
--- F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896 - 1940)
"You don't write because you want to say something, you write because you have something to say."
If you are alive right now Mr. Fitzgerald, I'd like to meet you face to face. If your heart hadn't failed on you sixty odd years ago while halfway through you last book The Last Tycoon, you would've finished the book and write so many more brilliant literature worthy of generations after generations of readers. But you left behind merely this handful of work, and though I cannot say that it isn't adequate. I'm just saying that it'd be nice to have a lot more.
"It takes a genius to whine appealingly."
The very first book that I picked up of yours was The Great Gatsby, sometime in the beginning of last year, and I remember falling in love with your beautiful style of writing. It has affected my own style of writing ever since, and I don't particularly remember any other authors, living or dead, influencing me so much in terms of the writing style other than yourself. It'd be blasphemy of sorts to say that my writing style is modeled after you, because I am sure they are nowhere near your brilliance and greatness. However, I do try my very best to live up to you, and I hope to write as great as you, Mr. Fitzgerald.
"Show me a hero and I'll write you a tragedy."
I am currently reading the last of your five major works, Tender Is The Night. And so far, it has been a really good read. The thing I like about your writing is that it is smooth as it is deep. The way the sentences flowed with one another, felt like a drop of red ink into a cup of milk, and skimming my eyes over the words felt like brushing the tips of my fingers over a pure silk suit. The truth is, there are authors out there with a great story, but haven't the ability to express them in a comfortable, soothing manner to me. While there are authors out there with a brilliant writing style, but always revolving around the same plot and materials.
"No such thing as a man willing to be honest - that would be like a blind man willing to see."
And as for you, Mr. Fitzgerald, you seem to be the master of both areas. I've just read John Updike's "Rabbit, Run", and as much as I appreciated his writing style, the way the scenery and the characters felt like they were crawling out from the pages, I didn't particularly like his style of writing. Thus, I found myself jumping a couple of paragraphs towards the end of the book, wanting it to end as soon as possible. Of course, your book laid at the end of that one, and that was the perfect reason - or excuse - to skip those paragraphs.
"Genius goes around the world in its youth incessantly apologizing for having large feet. What wonder that later in life it should be inclined to raise those feet too swiftly to fools and bores."
Once in a while, people come up to you and ask about a time in the past century you would like to visit if you have the ability to time travel. I've always told them that I want to go back to the Jazz Age, or the 1920s. I have no idea why actually. Perhaps I've always harbored the hope that somewhere in New York, I might bump into somebody who knows somebody who knows somebody who knows Jay Gatsby. Or even, if I am lucky enough, I might meet Jay Gatsby itself! What a treat!
"An author ought to write for the youth of his own generation, the critics of the next, and the schoolmaster of ever afterwards."
But truth to be told, I think the greatness of Jay Gatsby, to me, wasn't because of his tragic romance but because of what he went through, and how that reflected myself in reality. To look for Jay Gatsby for me would be as easy as looking into the mirror at times, without the fancy parties and the exquisite house to accompany the image but, that is as close as I can get I guess. Nonetheless, I have always respected your works afterwards, even if they do not particularly suit my brand of tea(This Side of Paradise, for example). By the way, The Beautiful and Damned is horribly under-rated. You might want to rise from your grave and protest about it.
"The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function."
All and all, you are a great writer missing from the world, and it is such a pity that we do not have a writer such as yourself, with the ability to write with the utmost depth with the purest simplicity and style. I swear, all the beauty in Jay Gatsby can be found in your words alone, and nobody can replace that brilliance of yours, even if they manage to come close in the years to come. On par, yes. But never be replaced. You are dearly missed Mr. Fitzgerald, and very much so.
"In a real dark night of the soul, it is always three o'clock in the morning, day after day."
--- F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896 - 1940)
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