Forging Ahead

By F. Scott Fitzgerald

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald (September 24, 1896 – December 21, 1940) was an American author of novels and short stories, whose works are the paradigmatic writings of the Jazz Age. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century. Fitzgerald is considered a member of the "Lost Generation" of the 1920s. He finished four novels: "This Side of Paradise", "The Beautiful and Damned", "The Great Gatsby" (his most famous), and "Tender Is the Night". A fifth, unfinished novel, "The Love of the Last Tycoon", was published posthumously. Fitzgerald also wrote many short stories that treat themes of youth and promise along with age and despair.

Fitzgerald's work has been adapted into films many times. His short story, "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button", was the basis for a 2008 film. "Tender Is the Night" was filmed in 1962, and made into a television miniseries in 1985. "The Beautiful and Damned" was filmed in 1922 and 2010. "The Great Gatsby" has been the basis for numerous films of the same name, spanning nearly 90 years: 1926, 1949, 1974, 2000, and 2013 adaptations. In addition, Fitzgerald's own life from 1937 to 1940 was dramatized in 1958 in "Beloved Infidel".

• Language: English
• Publisher: BoD E-Short
• Release date: Apr 14, 2015
• ISBN: 9783734784378

F. Scott Fitzgerald

F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940) is regarded as one of the greatest American authors of the 20th century. His short stories and novels are set in the American ‘Jazz Age’ of the Roaring Twenties and include This Side of Paradise, The Beautiful and Damned, Tender Is the Night, The Great Gatsby, The Last Tycoon, and Tales of the Jazz Age.

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Forging Ahead

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Forging Ahead

Basil Duke Lee and Riply Buckner, Jr., sat on the Lees' front steps in the regretful gold of a late summer afternoon. Inside the house the telephone sang out with mysterious promise.

I thought you were going home, Basil said.

I thought you were.

I am.

So am I.

Well, why don't you go, then?

Why don't you, then?

I am.

They laughed, ending with yawning gurgles that were not laughed out but sucked in. As the telephone rang again, Basil got to his feet.

I've got to study trig before dinner.

Are you honestly going to Yale this fall? demanded Riply skeptically.

Yes.

Everybody says you're foolish to go at sixteen.

I'll be seventeen in September. So long. I'll call you up tonight.

Basil heard his mother at the upstairs telephone and he was immediately aware of distress in her voice.

Yes. . . . Isn't that awful, Everett! . . . Yes. . . . Oh-h my! After a minute he gathered that it was only the usual worry about business and went on into the kitchen for refreshments. Returning, he met his mother hurrying downstairs. She was blinking rapidly and her hat was on backward--characteristic testimony to her excitement.

I've got to go over to your grandfather's.

What's the matter, mother?

Uncle Everett thinks we've lost a lot of money.

How much? he asked, startled.

Twenty-two thousand dollars apiece. But we're not sure.

She went out.

Twenty-two thousand dollars! he repeated in an awed whisper.

His ideas of money were vague and somewhat debonair, but he had noticed that at family dinners the immemorial discussion as to whether the Third Street block would be sold to the railroads had given place to anxious talk of Western Public Utilities. At half-past six his mother telephoned for him to have his dinner, and