Ten pages in I was cursing F. Scott Fitzgerald. I remember really enjoying The “Great Gatsby,” and coupled with a recommendation from a friend I had high hopes.
Sitting in the blazing afternoon sun while trying to get the reading project back on track, all I could think about was Hemingway’s “A Farewell To Arms.” I hated that book from the beginning and don’t think there’s any way I’ll be dipping in the Hemingway pool again.
“The Beautiful And Damned” took a different course, suddenly becoming a very engaging read after the initial drudgery with which it began. I was later reminded by The Recommender that she had warned me about the slow start. I think she made that up.
The overall tone brought back memories of Oscar Wilde, with a number of characters you don’t necessarily like but still want to follow. They begin young and idealistic without the day-to-day worry of being concerned with money. The protagonist, Anthony, is little concerned about his eventual inheritance from his aging grandfather. It’s only a matter of time in his mind that a heart will stop beating and he can go cash a check.
Unfortunately for Anthony, he doesn’t quite get to Plan B. I mean, if you see millions of dollars “surely” in your future, who wants to get a job? It must have been so awful being an aristocrat in those days. It’s certainly no fun to not have to work if you can’t sit around and play video games on your giant HD television. All they could do was have nightly drunk-off-their-face parties and spend the days recovering. Who needs a job when you could just do that?
If only he had found a wife who had a bit more drive: “I just want to be lazy and I want some of the people around me to be doing things, because that makes me feel comfortable and safe–and I want some of them to be doing nothing at all, because they can be graceful and companionable for me.”
That sounds like she wouldn’t much mind if her husband actually went out and worked for a living. Unless of course she wanted him to be in the group of doing nothing. Asked if she approved of lazy men, she said, “I suppose so, if they’re gracefully lazy.”
Now gracefully lazy is something I could get into. Just have to find a couple million dollars to cover my Taco Bell trips and child support payments. I mean, Taco Bell trips and um, miscellaneous expenditures. Yeah, we’ll go with that.
Anthony, emboldened by his wife’s enabling shows some true entrepreneurial spirit and does…nothing. Oh and then he blames her, because after all it’s definitely her fault. “As a matter of fact I think that if I hadn’t met you I would have done something,” he said. “But you make leisure so subtly attractive.”
She completely derailed his career of pretending like he was going to do something, instead leaving him with just doing nothing. If Fitzgerald were writing today, the two wouldn’t be addicted to laziness. Rather they’d be going through rehab for their codependent meth addictions, and failing miserably at that.
Should I be worried that I was completely into characters with those traits? I think I’ll go check myself into rehab as a precaution. I don’t want this to be a gateway book. But hey, if you’re looking for some “good stuff,” you might want to give it a shot. Just remember the first 10 pages are a bear, and don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Hugs not drugs.
Next up: “At Home In The World: Collected writings of Daniel Pearl”