Dogs: F. Scott Fitzgerald Essay

Submitted By alittleappalled
Words: 634
Pages: 3

Charlie and Helen Wales relationship in the short story “Babylon Revisited” echoes the author Scott Fitzgerald’s marriage with his wife Zelda. The main character face many similar situations as Fitzgerald did in the 1930s (Churchwell). Both men went through a stage of careless money squandering and with that recklessness it eventually led up to them being penniless. The loss of their significant other is another similar aspect of these men’s lives, whether that lost be to an illness or death. Losing their relationships was the cost of extravagance. The duties of being a father to a child with no mother are faced by both Fitzgerald and Charlie. They fight for not only just there honour back but for their daughter. The two men lost everything over nothing. The Fitzgerald’s were treated as icons in New York during the twenties after the success of his first published bestseller novel The Side of Paradise (Whittington-Egan). They became celebrities and began living the high life. Biographers claimed a normal day for Scott would be waking up at 11am and begin writing at 5pm till three in the morning but the reality was that he and Zelda would usually be found among the cabarets, clubs of Montmartre, and/or the Left Bank. They drank, danced, flirted and fought into the early hours of the morning (Churchwell). The glamorous life of America`s celebrity culture really took a toll on their relationship. During the 1930s Zelda was diagnosed with schizophrenia and had endless visits to mental institutions, clinics, and psychiatric hospital wards begun (Whittington-Egan). In the early Thirties Fitzgerald found himself battling alcoholism like Charlie in the short story. With these road blocks it became increasingly harder for Fitzgerald to write relatable stories that would earn him enough money for Zelda’s medical bills and their daughter education. Just eight months after Zelda’s breakdown, “Babylon Revisited” was written (Churchwell). Charlie and Helen experienced the night life of Paris as described in the short story to. “He passed a lighted door from which issued music, and stopped with the sense of familiarity; it was Bricktop’s, where he had parted with so many hours and so much money” (Fitzgerald, p.21). Like in the Fitzgerald own life, Charlie and Helen experienced the high life and let the pressures and luxuries of it all bring them down. The end results are the same in both Charlie and Scott’s life, they both become alcoholic’s and lose their sense of self. Helen