Flappers and Philosophers

Published soon after Fitzgerald¿s debut novel This Side of Paradise, Flappers and Philosophers was the author¿s first collection of short fiction, a form through which he had gained notoriety in newspapers and magazines. The familiar themes of aspiration and social satire already permeate his writing: in ¿Bernice Bobs Her Hair¿ the fashionable Marjorie attempts to turn her dowdy cousin into a debutante, before betraying her out of jealousy, while ¿The Ice Palace¿ features a Southern belle whose engagement to a Northerner finds her confronted with a cultural clash between tradition and modernity.Also containing ¿The Offshore Pirate¿, ¿Head and Shoulders¿, ¿The Cut-Glass Bowl¿, ¿Benediction¿, ¿Dalyrimple Goes Wrong¿ and ¿The Four Fists¿, this volume of stories illustrates the early stages of Fitzgerald¿s development as a writer and provides an entertaining chronicle of America in the 1910s.