Fitzgerald&rsquo;s second novel, a devastating portrait of the excesses of the Jazz Age, is a largely autobiographical depiction of a glamorous, reckless Manhattan couple and their spectacular spiral into tragedy. Published on the heels of This Side of Paradise, the story of the Harvard-educated aesthete Anthony Patch and his willful wife, Gloria, is propelled by Fitzgerald&rsquo;s intense romantic imagination and demonstrates an increased technical and emotional maturity. The Beautiful and Damned is at once a gripping morality tale, a rueful meditation on love, marriage, and money, and an acute social document. As Hortense Calisher observes in her Introduction, &ldquo;Though Fitzgerald can entrance with stories so joyfully youthful they appear to be safe&mdash;when he cuts himself, you will bleed.&rdquo;<br /><br />This book has caused an even greater sensation in America than This Side of Paradise. It is a long, searching, and absolutely convincing study of degeneration, that degeneration which ruins so many of the rich, young, idle people. The &quot;smart set&quot; of New York is hurled into the limelight and mercilessly revealed. A witty, pungent, and entirely orginal book. An excellent portrayal of the Eastern elite at the beginning of the Jazz Age.