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H.L. Mencken Reviews the Great Gatsby (1925)

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Re: H.L. Mencken Reviews the Great Gatsby (1925)

#21

Post by 082349872349872 »

lostlogin wrote: post #16
082349872349872 wrote: post #2

Mencken has a point: Gatsby , like much famous Science Fiction, derives its strength neither from story nor from depth of characterisation, but from the world which it depicts.

Above jihadjihad mentions how very American the book is. Their comment combined with yours might explain my bemusement once I’d finished it. ‘What was that and why is it so well regarded?’

Not only was it very American in 1925 (perhaps Mencken wondered why a fish would write such cardboard about water?) but it still is.

Very few days go by when the HN Front Page does not remind me of Jay Gatz:

Gatz' schedule:

  Rise from bed..................................6.00...........A.M.
  Dumbell exercise and wall-scaling..............6.15 - 6.30...."
  Study electricity, etc.........................7.15 - 8.15...."      
  Work...........................................8.30 - 4.30....P.M.
  Baseball and sports............................4.30 - 5.00...."
  Practice elocution, poise and how to attain it.5.00 - 6.00...."
  Study needed inventions........................7.00 - 9.00...."
general resolves:

  No wasting time at Shafters or [a name, indecipherable].
  No more smoking or chewing.
  Bath every other day.
  Read one improving book or magazine per week.
  Save $5.00 [crossed out] $3.00 per week.
  Be better to parents.
Edit: and compare the reference made by the book Tom Buchanan was reading with our spate of anti-woke tweets or "replacement theory" videos, and you will have a good idea of the amount of technical and moral progress the US has made between the 1920s and the 2020s.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rising_Tide_of_Color_Again...

Re: H.L. Mencken Reviews the Great Gatsby (1925)

#22

Post by 082349872349872 »

ghaff wrote: post #18
lostlogin wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Above jihadjihad mentions how very American the book is. Their comment combined with yours might explain my bemusement once I’d finished it. ‘What was that and why is it so well regarded?’

Fitzgerald was very American--and specifically very Northeast upper class. He was even a writer on the film [Dartmouth] Winter Carnival in 1939--not one of the great 1939 films--but, so the story goes, he ended up getting kicked off the picture because he kept getting drunk in Dartmouth fraternities. I suspect some familiarity with that milieu helps one appreciate Fitzgerald just as some familiarity with the South he…

The intersection of Fitzgerald and Faulkner is in the latter's comment on leaving his post office job, when he said he reckoned he'd be at the beck and call of rich folk all his life, but at least now he would no longer be at the beck and call of any SOB who had the few cents to buy a stamp...

Re: H.L. Mencken Reviews the Great Gatsby (1925)

#23

Post by motohagiography »

Gatsby, like most officially great novels, is the least good of Fitzgerald's books. Tender is the Night and The Beautiful and the Damned were way better. There was something about critics of the time who needed to suffer to appreciate anything and it was good of Mencken to hold Fitzgerald to his own standards, but what made authors of the era great were the books that were actually enjoyable. When you look at other authors of the era, where W. Sommerset Maughm is known for his miserable slog, Of Human Bondage, when The Razors Edge, Cakes and Ale, and the Painted Veil were way better, and he's even credited with being the precursor of the spy novel with his Ashenden stories. Hemmingway was a short story writer, but somehow he is remembered for the fawning reception of Farewell to Arms. Evelyn Waugh was savagely funny if you have read Scoop, Decline and Fall or Black Mischief, but Brideshead Revisited was the critical success that got made into a sappy miniseries.

It's like critics take your least spectacular and most vulnerable work and tag you with it as your best so as to ensure you are never known for the great stuff that got you on their radar and that might put their own work to shame. However, it doesn't matter, their lives are absurd. Quite a number of them make a living criticising food now, mostly because it can't defend itself.

The era of great criticism that began with characters like Mencken and, earlier, Bierce ended with the death of Christopher Hitchens I think. None of them, including Vidal, or Hunter S. Thompson would survive the culture today. I think it's too bad that the idea of a literary rivalry now seems as dated as fighting a duel with sabres, and it's as though there is nobody writing today who is capable of putting down a challenger when instead they can claim to be the victim of harassment to attract a mob. Mencken was great, and given Fitzgeralds other work, his Gatsby review was an act of mercy, but I bet he would be banned from social platforms and probably have trouble getting a bank account if he were writing today. Hard to say what we lost, but reading Mencken now, it's definitely gone.

Re: H.L. Mencken Reviews the Great Gatsby (1925)

#24

Post by johndhi »

motohagiography wrote: post #23

Gatsby, like most officially great novels, is the least good of Fitzgerald's books. Tender is the Night and The Beautiful and the Damned were way better. There was something about critics of the time who needed to suffer to appreciate anything and it was good of Mencken to hold Fitzgerald to his own standards, but what made authors of the era great were the books that were actually enjoyable. When you look at other a…

Not sure I agree. You, as with most critics actually, seem to be asserting there are clear "quality" lines to be drawn between great novels. IMO we're into the realm of subjectivity here and it's really up to the reader to decide what they like.

I didn't like Tender is the Night too much, and I love Hemingway's novels more than his stories (generally), chiefly The Sun Also Rises and For Whom the Bell Tolls. Do I know better than you or do famous critics know better than me? I don't think so.

Re: H.L. Mencken Reviews the Great Gatsby (1925)

#25

Post by elliekelly »

jihadjihad wrote: post #5

I was lucky not to have The Great Gatsby ruined for me by having to read it in high school. I borrowed it from the library a couple years ago, and wondered if it could live up to the massive hype around it. I have to say that it does. Mencken's critique seems to be that for all the craftsmanship Fitzgerald displays on the page, the story itself is rather thin and contrived. I don't think I'd disagree with that, thoug…

As an adult it’s quite fun to re-read all of the books I “hated” in high school. They’re so much more enjoyable!

Re: H.L. Mencken Reviews the Great Gatsby (1925)

#27

Post by yamtaddle »

elhudy wrote: post #15

I’ve never quite been able to put into words why The Great Gatsby falls short of my expectations for a “classic” novel, but Mencken nails it. This was a fascinating review and i look forward to exploring more of Mencken’s writings. Thank you for sharing.

Length is probably a factor. It packs a lot of nice prose in a slim little volume. Its simple story and characters are, at least, more complex than your average pulp adventure tale—combine that and the length and it's just about an ideal Baby's First Real Literary Novel, which is probably why it's assigned so much in high school and 100-level undergrad literature courses.

I also take a bit more depth from between the lines in the novel, than it may always get credit for, but that may just be me. Largely due to Fitzgerald sticking (perhaps too much) to his perspective character's limitations, there's a lot happening just off the page. A lot of suggestion, a lot left to the reader to fill in, which I personally enjoy.

Re: H.L. Mencken Reviews the Great Gatsby (1925)

#28

Post by eternalban »

johndhi wrote: post #24
motohagiography wrote: post #23

Gatsby, like most officially great novels, is the least good of Fitzgerald's books. Tender is the Night and The Beautiful and the Damned were way better. There was something about critics of the time who needed to suffer to appreciate anything and it was good of Mencken to hold Fitzgerald to his own standards, but what made authors of the era great were the books that were actually enjoyable. When you look at other a…

Not sure I agree. You, as with most critics actually, seem to be asserting there are clear "quality" lines to be drawn between great novels. IMO we're into the realm of subjectivity here and it's really up to the reader to decide what they like. I didn't like Tender is the Night too much, and I love Hemingway's novels more than his stories (generally), chiefly The Sun Also Rises and For Whom the Bell Tolls. Do I know…

You are denying that writing is an art that has its own inherent (~objective) system of evaluation that transcends the grasp/reading of a specific reader. The individual reader is entitled to its opinion, but any given school of criticism within the confines of the discipline (here writing) is also entitled to its professional assessment of the work.

We make distinction between great and good code. We celebrate certain software at the source code level. And what should we think of say someone who has never written a line of code telling us that there are no clear lines separating source codes and dismiss us as "critics".

Mencken gave a professional review. He rated the story as banal, but true to the scene depicted. He rated the character development as spotty. But he seemed pretty excited about the crafting of the sentences and pages. Now this here is something that will likely escape the notice of the general reader (they may just 'like it a lot' but won't be able to tell you why) but a pro like Mencken zeroes in on that.

Re: H.L. Mencken Reviews the Great Gatsby (1925)

#30

Post by myrmidon »

Tomte wrote: post #11

Mencken is very quotable. For example: > Evil. That which one believes of others. It is a sin to believe evil of others, but it is seldom a mistake. > There is always an easy solution to every human problem—neat, plausible, and wrong.

My favorite:

> The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all.

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