Babylon Revisited ~ F. Scott Fitzgerald ~ June 10-14 ~ Short Stories

[PatH]

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Short Stories - Some SeniorLearn Favorites - JUNE ~ JULY

It is said that a good short story should include: * a strong theme, * a fascinating plot, * a fitting structure, * unforgettable characters, * a well-chosen setting, * an appealing style.  Let's consider these elements as we discuss the following stories.  Is it necessary to include them all in a successful story? 
 

Notice that the titles are all links to the stories.

Discussion Schedule:
June 1 -June 9: *The Book of The Funny Smells--and Everything (1872) by Eleanor H Abbott *The Necklace or The Diamond Necklace (1880) -  by Guy de Maupassant *A Pair of Silk Stockings (1896) by Kate Chopin
June 10- 14: *Babylon Revisited by F.Scott Fitzgerald
June 15- 17: *First Confession by Frank O'Connor

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BABYLON REVISITED by F.Scott Fitzgerald

Topics for  Consideration
June 10 - June 14

Click this link for French terms  appearing in Babylon Revisited) -

Have you revisited your own past, physically, mentally?  What were the best years, the worst?     “strident queens” - two words that date this story.  Today from the lamposts in my capitol city of Columbus, Ohio we have  colorful banners promoting  the “Stonewall Pride” parade.  -  http://www.stonewallcolumbus.org/  - times have changed.  Is this progress?  Fitzgerald states that despite the economy, whether up or down - prostitution is a good business.  What did you think when you read this? “Now at least you can go into a store without their assuming you’re a millionaire.”   Is this still true?  Do Europeans or the world, for that matter, still believe every American is wealthy? Charlie believes in “character” - the “eternally valuable element.”  But “everything wore out.”  What did Charlie mean? DL Contact: Ella Gibbons

[Ella Gibbons]

Such an interesting way of looking at the story, BARBARA, a good way, a  hope of restored reason, good living.  Thanks for that, it gives another way of thinking about the story.

And another insight into the story, MARCIE, there are so many.  As JOANP said a few posts ago, it is a lot to digest.  We perhaps, too easily, attempt to attach the story to Fitzgerald’s own life, but dissipation seems to me to be the theme of at least a portion of Charlie's life and our author's..

Dissipation - to waste, squander, carouse.

I looked the word up in my American Heritage Dictionary and behold I find this:  “He could dissipate without going to pieces “ (F.Scott Fitzgerald)

He is quoted in the Dictionary!

THANK ALL OF YOU FOR YOUR WONDERFUL INSIGHTFUL REMARKS, IT’S GREAT READING THEM EACH DAY.

WE HAVE TWO MORE DAYS TO DISCUSS THE STORY OR ANY PART THEREOF, OR ANYTHING YOU WOULD LIKE TALK ABOUT.  REMINISCES, A WALK DOWN MEMORY LANE, ANYTHING?

[Ella Gibbons]

I had no idea this existed.  BIO -

Here authors, such as Joseph Heller, Tobias Wolf, Jane Smalley and Garrison Keillor, discuss the merits of Scott Fitzgerald's life.

http://www.biography.com/people/f-scott-fitzgerald-9296261

[ginny]

I'm new to Fitzgerald and this discussion but I have read all of your comments carefully.

I was struck by so many things in the story. I can't figure out the divisions, what they mean. Is there a reason for them? Do they indicate something?  I didn't understand...he went back to Paris in 1931, is that the time of the story  or is that only the date of the writing? The rich "good times" are gone, that's clear. Is the narrator reliable?

I didn't know why the old times are gone...why are they? The stock market crash?  As the story goes on the conversations seem to reveal one by one what happened.  One thing about Fitzgerald's writing I've noticed  is he puts you in the middle, in medias res,  and then you have to figure out what's going on? That's what keeps me reading. I am not sure I know. They money's gone. The good times are gone. Were they such good times? Marion and her husband don't seem to think so.

Ella asked if none of us have known a drinker. I am pretty sure if any of us did know an alcoholic  on a personal level, that is, a level at which we would  be personally  affected, I am pretty sure that would be a very painful experience nobody would want to idly chat about. His "ways," was it only alcohol or was it this profligate spending and rich living, that really anger Marion?

The thing that struck me the most about this character is his distance. He's distanced not only from the Paris he knew and the bar where he felt "ownership," but his daughter, and it appears just about everything and everybody else including his wife who dies, as we see, possibly? Possibly because of his behavior, (who knows, her character is only fleshed out by the small revelations, that seems to be Fitzgerald's forte, and he's good at it. Is the sister also displaying a family trait in taking to her bed, was that her dead sister's way of coping or was Helen really a mess? Or was she a mess at all, he's the one in the sanitarium...Certainly he's now distanced from his "friends" in the bar whom he now sees as drunks and fools.

But I'm not sure I trust his version, or his reliability in relating it. Marion and her husband are there, it seems to me, to provide a more sober picture anyway, an opposing  version.

I keep thinking of the Cheers theme, you want to go where everybody knows your name...and they're always glad you came....I just came from Germany where you can sit on a step at 9:30 am waiting for a museum to open,  and watch the bar across the street with people in it, sitting even in the window sills,  cheering on some soccer team, with foot high lager glasses, swigging it down,  is everybody HAPPY? They certainly seem to be.  What happens by 10 pm, tho?  I found out on one train watching a small woman down three of those foot high things, by  about 4 pm; it wasn't long before there was a tear in  her beer, not perhaps the best environment for any of us at the table.

At one point Fitzgerald has the character say, you have to be drunk to appreciate this (or words to that affect).


Did his drunk acquaintances  ruin his chances? I don't think so. If you look carefully  Marion wanted to retain her legal guardianship, even while agreeing, they were all polite, that the child could go with Charlie.  What did that mean? It reminds me of a Tom Cruise movie where the father tries to repent, tries to get the kids back (or the Dustin Hoffman movie about the father Mrs. Doubtfire, trying to make it good and get the kids back). Looks like Fitzgerald did it first.  But Marion even in the best of times didn't want to give up her legal rights (apparently there are no rights for parents in 1931 Paris, no legal system?) She was waiting for what she saw as inevitable. 10 months since he had seen the child.


Have there been other  books that I have missed  written by alcoholics about the alcoholic's feelings? Are they all that distanced from everybody else? That calculating? Marion is upset, initially, as she would be. His reaction?  "She had built up all her fear of life into one wall and faced it toward him....." and then " It had all happened at a point in her life where the discouragement of ill health and adverse circumstances made it necessary for her to believe in tangible villainy and a tangible villain."

Really?

He's...is he making excuses, deflecting her anger by giving it a cause?  Other than himself and his own culpability? Is he "cured?"  I notice in time of stress he feels he needs a drink.

Bottom  line: if YOU were Marion what would YOU do? Would the appearance of the drunks make a difference to you? That really IS the bottom line here. Is it "unfair" that the two former acquaintances found the address and came by? THEY ruined it for him?  

Can you not turn over a new leaf then? Has he actually?

The word Babylon also  has  led me on a wild goose chase. Having confused the Tower of Babel with the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, I have had to do some delving myself. apparently they are connected, after all. That makes a lot more sense to me, in that in the so called Tower of  Babel, everybody was speaking in a different language and nobody knew what the other was saying. That is the case, to me, in the story, too.  Other than that I have no idea what the "Revisited" means, how interesting. What's being revisited? I think you all have made some great suggestions but I don't see anything except the old ways, the drunks, actually being done over? Or?  The daughter? The promise of a  "do over"? Very complex story (especially when you keep thinking of it as the Tower of Babel) hahahahaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

That's what passes for random thought for me on this one, but it's powerful.  I'm wondering why the story was written. I don't know anything about Fitzgerald's private life, don't want to, really,  tho he died young apparently of alcoholism but I  wonder if this story,  it just occurred to me, that in this story there seems to be  an attempt to show how you really can't escape your past and make it right again.  Several people here have said that you can't get rid of the baggage of your past and it occurred to me that maybe Fitzgerald is using the story to show how unfair it really all is if a man is repentant  and no matter what he does,  he can't wipe the slate clean.

Maybe there's more Fitzgerald in this one than initially seemed to be. It may be his own excuse.

[JoanK]

"The idea of “dissipation” as an active loss is perhaps the story’s central insight."

That's very interesting.

One point that interests me in the story is the life Fitzgerald is comparing to that of dissipation. Surely his in-laws represent the "happy family" life that Charlie wants to create for his daughter. And yet his sister-in-law is so disturbed that she has to go to bed for days after the scene. Is he saying something about his view of the alternative to his former life, or is he just so used to disturbed women, that he assumes that's how women act?

[nlhome]

There's always at least two "sides" in a relationship. I think the sister was blaming Charlie for everything that happened, yet it wouldn't have been all his "fault."

He seemed to be trying to get his life back in order; maybe he couldn't in Paris, though, because it seems neither friends nor family were willing to let him change. The friends, perhaps, resented his strength; the family because it meant he wouldn't then be the guilty one they could blame everything on, including having another child in the family.

[Ella Gibbons]

Hey, GINNY, good to see you!.  Many of us have had little or no contact with a Fitzgerald story except THE GREAT GATSBY, which is a classic.

Did you like the story?   I agree Fitzgerald does bring you into the middle, but reading carefully provides answers to some of the questions.  Not all, by any means  I was left with wondering who gets the child or who should have the child.  Obviousy she wants to live with Daddy.  But it's up to the reader, is Daddy truly reformed? 

Should we give him the chance to prove it?  The same question that we ask of a former prisoner, a mental patient.  Do we give them employment?

I'm not sure, are you, that Marion's home is the best either.  So there is the quandry.

Most of us agree that the theme or moral of the story, if that be the case, is you cannot escape your past.  Fitzgerald, undoubtedly, had occasion to hope he could, but he was never able to stop drinking, get his life back on an even keel, get a proper home for Zelda and his child. 
. 

[Ella Gibbons]

Hi JOANK. Do you think the sister-in-law's home is the best influence on the child?  Is that a happy home?  Marion with her sudden illnesses and the rut that the husband seems to be in.  Compare that to the life that Charlie promises.

Loss as the central insight of the story?  Yes, I agree.  Charlie's loss, the child's loss.  A family's loss, the death of the mother.

A sad story, as we have said before, mirroring Fitzgerald's own life.

[Ella Gibbons]

NLHOME (can't remember your given name) what an interesting remark:  "The friends, perhaps, resented his strength; the family because it meant he wouldn't then be the guilty one they could blame everything." 

Yes, I never thought of resentment, but it is true.  Marion did want to blame him for her sister's death; it's human to find blame for something that hurts.  Children do it early in life, don't they?

Thanks for your remarks.

[Ella Gibbons]

Tomorrow is our last day, I believe, for our Fitzgerald story.  Let's take a few moments to think how we would have written the story differently .

Woul you have started the beginning in a different way?

How would you have entitled it?

How would you  have ended it?

Would you have introduced Lorraine and Duncan in the story?  To what effect did they alter the story?

Would you have described the terrible scene between Charlie and his wife in the same way?  Could it have been improved?  What did it add to the story?

Did you like the story?  Why?

[PatH]

There's always at least two "sides" in a relationship. I think the sister was blaming Charlie for everything that happened, yet it wouldn't have been all his "fault."

That's very important.  Fitzgerald came up with a memorable line about it:

"He looked at her, startled. With each remark the force of her dislike became more and more apparent. She had built up all her fear of life into one wall and faced it toward him."

[PatH]

One more day?  I thought we had two.  Anyway, I know you won't lock the door for a while, but I'll start my summing up.

Loss, dissipation, the difficulty of escaping your past—all themes, both in this story and Fitzgerald’s life.  One thing I noticed is that in a way, Fitzgerald is rewriting his own problems to make them just a little more hopeful.  Charlie lost all his money, but is now making good money again, maybe will continue to do so.  Bad luck has messed up this chance to get his daughter back, but he still has a good chance.  He drank himself into a hospital, but is now sober—who knows if it will last, but his chances look better than Fitzgerald’s did.  Charlie can’t ever get his wife back, but Fitzgerald may have realized that Zelda was lost to him in any meaningful sense too.

[BarbStAubrey]

With all the books written about both Scott Fitzgerald and T.S. Elliot - all written from their perspective and none written from the wives perspective, who both had daring party girl wives drinking too much and they no longer fit the accepted behavior for the life style of the men. The wives become sicker and you have to wonder if it in response to knowing they are a dissatisfaction to their husbands. So they become more ill and are committed.

Makes me feel very uncomfortable. To me it is like they were used up and all was well when the men were wanting a life of the party girl for a wife but then they want something different and the wives are ill from the party lifestyle but also, they become more ill trying to be themselves, and addicted while wanting the attention of their husbands.

Today they would be put on medication and a 30 day treatment center - possibly several times like Lindsay Lohan - but the life of a women that did not fit the "Marian" type mold was shut up much as Elenore of Aquitaine was locked away by Henry II of England. I think many women during this time actually went mad or killed themselves as Virgina Woolf.

[marcie]

What a lot of interesting and  helpful questions and comments. One of your questions, Ella, is:
Would you have introduced Lorraine and Duncan in the story?  To what effect did they alter the story?

They seem central to the story in a complicated way. When we first meet Charlie in that bar, he's asking the bartender about some of his old friends/associates. He leaves his address at his brother-in-law's house for "Mr. Schaeffer." The next day, when he is out with his daughter, he runs into Duncan Schaeffer and Lorraine Quarrles at the restaurant. He doesn't want to give them his address when they ask. We're told: "Somehow, an unwelcome encounter. They liked him because he was functioning, because he was serious; they wanted to see him, because he was stronger than they were now, because they wanted to draw a certain sustenance from his strength."

I'm wondering why he left his contact information (at his brother-in-law's house) at the bar? He wanted to be contacted by Duncan and now that he has been, he doesn't like the contact. The past seems to have an attraction for him. On his first night in Paris, we learn "He was curious to see Paris by night with clearer and more judicious eyes than those of other days." He seems to be courting disaster.... testing himself.

Some of you have mentioned his approach to taking one drink a day and no more. During his night-time stroll: "A few doors farther on he found another ancient rendezvous and incautiously put his head inside. Immediately an eager orchestra burst into sound, a pair of professional dancers leaped to their feet and a maître d'hôtel swooped toward him, crying, "Crowd just arriving, sir!" But he withdrew quickly. 'You have to be damn drunk,' he thought." Another "incautious" moment: "In the glare of a brasserie a woman spoke to him. He bought her some eggs and coffee, and then, eluding her encouraging stare, gave her a twenty-franc note and took a taxi to his hotel."

Is he trying to prove to others and to himself that he has conquered his "dissipated" past? Does it make him feel superior to others to show that now he has gained back control over his finances, his drinking... his life? Does he want to think that he's in a better position than his former friends and his sister-in-law?

As we see near the end,  Duncan and Lorraine "intrude" into the house. Their visit is unwanted by Charlie and everyone, Charlie says to his brother-in-law: ""I didn't tell them to come here. They wormed your name out of somebody. They deliberately--"  He doesn't seem to remember but it's almost certain it's because Charlie left his brother-in-law's address for Duncan that they are able to find him. If that unpleasant event didn't take place, would he have been happily reunited with his daughter?

I'm left wondering if Charlie isn't in as much control of his life as he thinks. Yet he doesn't take a second drink at the very end. I don't think that all hope for him is lost but he may have to face the situation that he'll have to find/make meaning in his life without his young daughter.

[salan]

I can appreciate the writing in this story.  However, I did not like the story.  It was too depressing and left too many questions unanswered.  That is the problem with short stories for me......they end before problems are solved and the characters never get fully developed.  FSF, however, did a good joy of developing these characters.
Sally 

[ginny]

Those are great points, Marcie. You've zeroed in on how they found his brother in law's place, and the bit about he seems drawn to the past and is testing himself perhaps.  Like Marion, from the clues we are carefully given,  I don't personally have confidence in him, either.

I don't believe I necessarily agree, Ella,   that the theme or moral of the story is you can't escape the past. I think Fitzgerald and maybe  Charlie would like it to be seen thus.  I hope that's not true in every case because there are an awful lot of people with pasts out there who have seemed to overcome tremendous odds.

I don't know anybody without a "past," but I have seen several who use it as an excuse. It's a major theme, but not the overarching one, I think, personally.

I keep thinking about Marion. Was her home better than Charlie's would have been, Ella asks? She's apparently stepped up to the plate, and by Charlie's own admission, has done a wonderful job.

If we knew for instance that Charlie was a child abuser could we understand Marion's reaction a bit more? I'm using that as an extreme example but she does know something we don't. As she sat by her sister's deathbed she learned something of her sister's life which even Charlie admits was torn.

I don't have a sister (or a brother), so I don't know the dynamics. However finding her sister locked out in a snowstorm has made a tremendous impression on her. Marion is possibly ill, what disease we don't know. She stepped up to the plate because her dying sister asked her to look after her child,  and she's done a great job.

In possibly the most poignant moment of the piece she turns to her husband, who seems remarkably equable,  for support after the imps and demons of the elephant in the living room, the Alcholosim, (which I think is more of a major theme than the past), physically  appear in the form of Duncan and Lorraine in her own home. Marion turns to Lincoln for support.  She doesn't get it.

What's left to her? She's to lose the child. She's outvoted. And to her the thought of the child living with Charlie is  intolerable. It literally makes her sick and she's apparently ill to begin with. She has no confidence in Charlie's reclamation.  Which type of home is better? Should he relapse again and lock out the child this time or worse, would that be a great home for the child?

I have a lot of sympathy for Marion, she's been betrayed by her husband initially  in this, she's lost her sister,  (tho Charlie opines they weren't that close in life, he didn't think) Really?  Maybe that's why she reacts as she does now, and why she  stepped up when he disappeared (in treatment?) for 10 months.

Which life is better for a child?

  I keep trying to think what I would have done in her place.

 I distrust Charlie. I am sure he wants one more chance. All his preparations (except the Nanny is certainly missing, isn't she?)  but it was Marion who  picked up the ball.

It's a very powerful and unfortunately true to life piece. Especially in 2013.  I agree in this short piece the characters are well defined but we actually  don't have all the answers, about them, or Helen or her life, or Charlie's "wanting a drink," when things go bad,  and of course never will.  It's pretty stunning. The second Fitzgerald I have read but it won't be my last. I'd like now to read something he won acclaim for and see what I think.

[Ella Gibbons]

Do we have tomorrow, the 14th?   Yes, I think you are right.  Days slip away, I lose track of them, thank you PATH for the reminder.

Oh, so many good remarks., but none of you have any suggestions as to how you would rewrite the story?  How you would change the ending.

SALAN, I'm sure you would change the story or not write it at all, too depressing.  Life is for an alcoholic, don't you think?   Why do people drink to excess?   Why drink at all?  Too escape?  '' 

Thanks, GINNY, for your ideas, I agree with some, not all.  Charlie does want to escape his past, he wants Marion to believe he has overcome his drinking so as to get his child back, a home life again, but he is wavering a bit, perhaps, stumbling is a better word. Paris is too painful for him, he should have stayed in Prague and become stronger.  He visits his old haunts, sees old friends, Duncan and Lorraine; as MARCIE stated the past still has an attraction for him.  

The question remains in the story, can he escape it and make a new life in Prague with child and sister?

Today, of course, as BARBARA said,  Zelda, would have been put on medication and escaped those years in a sanitarium, those years that also dragged Fitzgerald down as the expenses mounted for Zelda.  He always put her in the very best sanitariums of the day, she never wanted for anything.   HOwever, she was in and out, had vacations with Scottie and Fitz, and lunches , wrote extensive letters (many of which are quoted in the book that I have on Zelda).  Both of them  had affairs, both wrote extensively and were published authors, were jealous of each other, and loved each other until the end. Scott never stopped loving Zelda.




  

[Ella Gibbons]

Click below to see all the published stories and books by Zelda Fitzgerald:

http://www.sc.edu/fitzgerald/zeldabib.html

[Ella Gibbons]

And by Scott Fitzgerald:

http://www.duluth.lib.mn.us/Programs/Gatsby/Works.html

[Ella Gibbons]

GINNY brought up a thought about alcoholics and writers so I put the subject in Google with this result:''

http://listverse.com/2008/01/22/top-15-great-alcoholic-writers/

Many believed, as did F.S.Fitzgerald that drinking enhanced their writing, one wonders why?

[nlhome]

Is it then impossible for a recovering alcoholic to be happy? I don't get that sense in real life, I know alcoholics who are happy, just aware they need to take control in order to remain happy  - and in the story, I see a man who is dealing with his demons, trying to make amends in a way for bad choices he made that weren't necessarily all related to alcohol. I think the dissipation in his life was much more than the drinking.

A good short story can be open to so many ideas and interpretations.

[JudeS]

I read numerous articles on this unhappy couple. One of them mentioned that today there is a "Team Scott" and a "Team Zelda" fighting it out endlessly as to who was to blame for their unhappiness.
Mostly though, I was looking for information on the daughter "Scottie" who was the same age as the girl in the story.
She is after all the reason for the actions that move the characters most deeply.
The real girl it seems was brought up by Nannies in America and in France. As an adult she went to Vassar and became a Journalist for the Washington Post and the New Yorker. She married twice and had four children but said she felt burdened by her children and was not a good mother. One of her sons committed suicide and another became drug addicted.
Presently her oldest daughter is trying to write a book about her mothers life.
The girl in the story loves her "good times Daddy" but he does have a rather awful past. I can't blame his sister in law for her attitude. She has learned to love the girl and sees her as an integral part of her families life. How can she trust him not to fall back on his old ways? She can't and that is easy to understand. He has only one drink a day now. That is called a "Maintainence drinker". He can't really abstain completely.
Having worked for the Bureau of Drugs and Alcohol and seen how many lives are destroyed by these things it seems to me that Charlie should have requested a long visit with his daughter and slowly won over his in laws. He feels he has recovered but it is hard to believe that he will remain so and be able to give his daughter anything close to a normal life.
Like his use of Alcohol, Charlie was looking for a "quick fix".

[marcie]

nlhome, I'm inclined to agree with you that "A good short story can be open to so many ideas and interpretations." Charlie is no longer young but he's got more life to live. We don't know exactly what's in his future.

Do you all think there is a clue to the chances Fitzgerald sees for Charlie in the very last sentence?

Here is the last paragraph:
"He would come back some day; they couldn't make him pay forever. But he wanted his child, and nothing was much good now, beside that fact. He wasn't young any more, with a lot of nice thoughts and dreams to have by himself. He was absolutely sure Helen wouldn't have wanted him to be so alone.


It seems likely that the last time Charlie saw his wife was the evening that he locked her out of their apartment.... or, afterward, when she was in the hospital. Apparently, at or near the end of his wife's life, Charlie was recovering (from alchohol? a breakdown?) in a sanitarium. She asked her sister (not Charlie) to look after their daughter. Is it a revengeful Helen who might well want Charlie to be alone (in which case, the last sentece is his fantasy). Or is it the Helen with whom he was in love and who loved him who would want him to be with their daughter?

[ginny]

Oh such good points. Nlhome, I forgot to say in my long post how stunning I thought your prior post was and so on the money with: He seemed to be trying to get his life back in order; maybe he couldn't in Paris, though, because it seems neither friends nor family were willing to let him change. The friends, perhaps, resented his strength; the family because it meant he wouldn't then be the guilty one they could blame everything on, including having another child in the family. Wow!

And you're right, maybe that's what makes a good piece of literature, period, its timelessness and issues , and how we all see them differently. How many grandparents are raising children today!

In 2013! Whole families of children and great grandchildren for just this issue: hard drugs with or without alcohol?

I see Jude has some background in this issue and I am finding I agree with her take on Charlie: brilliant!
"Maintenance drinker." I didn't know that, is that a sign of relapse or not being entirely "cured?" Jude says he can't abstain completely. Does this type of being a new man actually work?

 I don't know the terms but I thought that Alcoholics  Anonymous has a tenet that "once an alcoholic always an alcoholic,"  and as nhlome said, it takes constant maintenance.  It's a double whammy apparently, a chemical drug addiction and something causing it, the need for the "quick fix" as Jude says. A hard thing to deal with says the woman perpetually on a diet.

I agree he'd have been better not to have come back to Paris. His "needing a drink" for stressful situations is to me a warning sign.

What's wrong with 6 months wait? Why is this so "sad?" 6 months is reasonable and nothing in time.  Perhaps if Marion and Lincoln,  who clearly can't afford it,  could see his new place and the arrangements,  they would feel better about it.

 If I were Marion he'd not take the child, period. I do feel for her. And I wouldn't retire to a bed to get my way but the devil drives when the needs must, she's said her piece, she's said this type of thing makes her sick, she's said that she has no confidence, and she's to lose the child anyway. So she uses the last piece in her arsenal and Lincoln capitulates. What is SIX MONTHS?

And now Marcie!  Is it a revengeful Helen who might well want Charlie to be alone (in which case, the last sentence is his fantasy). Or is it the Helen with whom he was in love and who loved him who would want him to be with their daughter?

Good question! I think that was Helen's realization that the child needed to be in sober capable hands, nothing to do with Charlie whose entire world seems to revolve around Charlie. And Charlie's needs.

So why does Helen appear to him in a gauzy dress on a swing, saying he should have the child but swinging out of reach and understanding?  Why is that in there?

This,  for some reason,  really made me angry: He was absolutely sure Helen wouldn't have wanted him to be so alone.

Really? REALLY?   Why is poor Charlie "so  alone? " This is the kind of thing that hits all my buttons. Charlie is not "cured." Can he be happy someday? Sure. Will he? Who knows? What drove him to drink in the first place which caused his problems now? Are those demons cured?   What is he pinning all his hopes for "happiness" on?

It is a great story which can bring all this speculation out, isn't it marvelous to have so many different takes on it?

And this is what a good  book discussion is for, quite a joy  to be able to be  participating in this one.

[Ella Gibbons]

Righto, then  I think I have it right!  

Today is our last day - our last thoughts on this story.

Do plan to continue right on posting in the next short story which begins toorrow.  All our great stories.

Charlie is in haste to make amends; but there is no quick and easy way to stop drinking is there?  Personally, I'm not sure he ever will; that one drink a day is no cure.  And if I were Marion I would keep that child until Charlie has stopped drinking altogether and realizes he can never take another.  He needs counseling, or AA, or something, and he needs to wake up from that dream he has of his dead wife, Helen - who asked Marion to look after her child not her husband.

Of course, the child, Honoria, will resent her for it, will blame her for the seaparation from Daddy.  This child seems to sense the difficulties, remembering the bad times when they were not rich.

ANY LAST THOUGHTS?

THANKS TO ALL OF YOU FOR YOUR POSTS!  I'VE LOVED EVERY DAY OF IT AND HOPE YOU WILL BE WITH HAROLD AND MYSELF IN AUGUST WHEN WE DISCUSS "THOSE ANGRY DAYS" by Lynn Oldon -a bitter, sometimes violent clash of personalities and ideas  between FDR and Charles Lindbergh that divided the nation and ultimately determined the fate of the free world.
 
  

[JoanP]

Ella, we're leaving all these short story discussions open throughout the month for further comment.  So keep on!  So much to think about still.
I've had some interuptions at this end...plan to get back into the swim here later this afternoon when Miss Cassidy goes home...A five year old who insists on my full attention.  I keep saying I'm going to get her out of this, but somehow, she always wins...

ps. We're looking forward to "THOSE ANGRY DAYS" in August...

[marcie]

I think that this story has room for lots of interpretations because it has complex characters. No one is perfect. There doesn't seem to be one "right" or "wrong" course of action.

We see alot of Charlie's weaknesses. We see some of Marion's too.

I'm not sure that Marion's assessment of Charlie is all about alcoholism. She always had a "curious disbelief" in her sister's happiness (the phrasing makes us unsure if she was correct in her disbelief or not) though it's weighted by the characterization that it was a "prejudice" on her part. During the back-and-forth when Charlie asks about getting Honoria back:

"Marion shuddered suddenly; part of her saw that Charlie's feet were planted on the earth now, and her own maternal feeling recognized the naturalness of his desire; but she had lived for a long time with a prejudice--a prejudice founded on a curious disbelief in her sister's happiness, and which, in the shock of one terrible night, had turned to hatred for him. It had all happened at a point in her life where the discouragement of ill health and adverse circumstances made it necessary for her to believe in tangible villainy and a tangible villain.

"I can't help what I think!" she cried out suddenly. "How much you were responsible for Helen's death, I don't know. It's something you'll have to square with your own conscience."

An electric current of agony surged through him; for a moment he was almost on his feet, an unuttered sound echoing in his throat. He hung on to himself for a moment, another moment.

"Hold on there," said Lincoln uncomfortably. "I never thought you were responsible for that."

"Helen died of heart trouble," Charlie said dully.

"Yes, heart trouble." Marion spoke as if the phrase had another meaning for her.

Then, in the flatness that followed her outburst, she saw him plainly and she knew he had somehow arrived at control over the situation. Glancing at her husband, she found no help from him, and as abruptly as if it were a matter of no importance, she threw up the sponge.

"Do what you like!" she cried, springing up from her chair. "She's your child. I'm not the person to stand in your way. I think if it were my child I'd rather see her--" She managed to check herself. "You two decide it. I can't stand this. I'm sick. I'm going to bed."

[PatH]

For me, one of the strong points of this story is its ambiguity.  We really have to decide a lot of things for ourselves.  Marion seems to me to be mentally or emotionally unstable, but that doesn't tell us whether she's right or wrong about Helen and Charlie; she sees nothing good about the marriage, and Charlie does, but he isn't reliable either.

I especially like the last line: "He was absolutely sure Helen wouldn't have wanted him to be so alone".  At first you think Charlie means Helen would want him to have their daughter back, but there's an additional possibility.  He made it possible for Duncan and Lorraine to track him down (though it turned out to be disastrous) and had been attracted to Lorraine in his old life.  Is this his temptation to get out of his lonely hotel room, track them down, and go out on the town with them?  And will he do it, or stand firm?

I've really enjoyed teasing apart this complicated story, and all of you made me see things I didn't notice.  Thanks to all for a great discussion.

[BarbStAubrey]

I am still haunted by the idea that adults for their own needs decide if a child should be raised by her parent as if any parent is perfect - it makes me feel like egos are pulling apart a child.

If this was only a story but it happens too frequently - because an adult is poor and gets into trouble. often for smoking pot that is now being made legal and they cannot afford a decent much less a good lawyer the state takes control of a child - more often than not the child simply swaps one set of dysfunction for another - taking a child from a parent tears at my heart and so this story remains for me sad and painful.

Lots of input and we all have our hot button and yes, I found Marian to be too self-righteous and I think Charles is correct, she will, not covertly but her dislike and blame will be under the surface and she would turn Honoria away from Charles.

Thanks Ella you really tackled an in depth story with many varied opinions beautifully - Kudos to you for bringing this story to our attention and for making all our opinions feel validated.

[JoanK]

"But he wanted his child, and nothing was much good now, beside that fact. He wasn't young any more, with a lot of nice thoughts and dreams to have by himself. He was absolutely sure Helen wouldn't have wanted him to be so alone"

Like Pat, I interpreted the last sentance as his excuse to reconnect with Lorraine; he is obviously sexually attracted to her. And given what we see of her, that will mean re-entering his old life. The fact that six months seems like forever to him shows that his desire for his daiughter is like his desire for a drink, or an affair: a "fix" that will magically make his life happy again. And if he does get her, it will be just as successful as the first two were.

But I'm not sure marion loves the child, either. The family that he shows doesn't make sense: no love shown between the adults or toward the child, but she seems happy and well adjusted. I don't know whether Fitzgerald meant to portray a happy family, and just didn't know what they look like, or an unhappy one, but wanted his daughter to be perfect anyway.

[nlhome]

My impression of Lorraine's behavior and his reaction makes me think he'd stay away from her.

[marcie]

I have to admit that when I first read that sentence about being alone, I too thought of Lorraine. Because I don't want the story to be about that, I think I talked myself out of that meaning....but obviously since you, Pat and JoanK, thought about it, it's a possibility (however remote  )

[marcie]

You all --your insights -- have motivated me to read the story again. Another metaphor that struck me is the many references to "paying."  It seems as if paying money is equated by Charlie to spending/using up/losing himself as opposed to giving and being enriched/developing himself.

Here are a few instances:

"It had been given, even the most wildly squandered sum, as an offering to destiny that he might not remember the things most worth remembering, the things that now he would always remember--his child taken from his control, his wife escaped to a grave in Vermont."

----
"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."

---
"All the catering to vice and waste was on an utterly childish scale, and he suddenly realized the meaning of the word "dissipate"--to dissipate into thin air; to make nothing out of something. In the little hours of the night every move from place to place was an enormous human jump, an increase of paying for the privilege of slower and slower motion."

---
There wasn't much he could do now except send Honoria some things; he would send her a lot of things tomorrow. He thought rather angrily that this was just money--he had given so many people money. . . .

"No, no more," he said to another waiter. "What do I owe you?"... He would come back some day; they couldn't make him pay forever."

[salan]

I was torn between wanting Charlie to have his child and wondering whether she might be better off with her aunt. He thinks   drinking is under control since he only allows himself 1 a day.  How much longer before that 1 becomes 2 and so on?  He returned to Paris and visited his old haunts...was he missing his life as it had been?
Sally

[ginny]

I agree, Sally, I think you've put  your finger on it.

I actually never thought of Lorraine either, nlhome, but I agree with Marcie that  Pat and JoanK have opened up a new possibility, and his   whiny "so alone," could well apply to, if not Lorraine, somebody else along the way, or even the camaraderie of a bar, the  "ownership" he felt in the old bars where everybody knew his name (but not, apparently that he had a child). So it's a superficial bonhomie.

"So alone." It's all about Charlie, isn't it? The child would have been alone for 10 months, mother dead, father missing, had it not been for Marion: any thoughts for her?

6 months is nothing, Charlie.

I really love all the different slants on this, and things you see. I missed the Lorraine connection entirely, I thought he was repulsed by her or turned off, but he gave them the address!

Oh the paying thing is brilliant, Marcie. Lots on paying. I thought it was odd that Lincoln said, while you were roaring we were just making do. I didn't quite understand there what  he meant? They don't have a lot of money, there are doormen and chauffeurs laughing on Charlie's tips, but Lincoln has taken on his child. The child will cost them, (Lincoln is in this too)  in addition to their own, quite a bit to raise and educate, and this apparently is 1931, the height of the Great Depression.  Is Lincoln saying he should be giving THEM child support? Is that his way of saying Marion resents you because we were struggling while you threw it away.

He threw so much away. And now he's so alone. I'm coming back to Barbara's dissipation: that was a GOOD set of points, there.

I love the "paying" theme. He's paid,  in his eyes, paid and paid and "paid his dues," as if it's only about him,  and now he wants his reward. More whining. This does not bode well.


I thought Ella had a stunning point about the child would resent Marion, I never thought of that, either. If Marion does not vilify or characterize Charlie as an alcoholic, the child may well resent her. If she does, bad on her, she hasn't so far, which is amazing considering the circumstances.

I'm not sure I see that there's no love between Lincoln and Marion, they are in a very stressful situation. Lincoln seems remarkable to me, trying to see both sides. Marion as a parent sees that Charlie wants finally to be a parent, and she  understands that,  but the elephant is still in the living room.

This thing, written in 1931, could be written today, I don't see it as dated, do you? Universal themes. Wonder why it's still relevant almost a century later, since we, in 2013, are so enlightened.

[nlhome]

Interesting the use of "escaped to a grave" when referring to his wife's death - leaving him behind in this awful world? That was her way of getting away from the dissipated life, leaving him behind to do the harder thing and remember it?

I realize that alcoholics are in denial until they face up to it - I understand there are programs other than AA that would look at Charlie's actions as getting control of his alcohol issues, and he has done it for a long time, at least that is what he says. I seem to remember someone saying he was self-centered - which is part of what I also understand about AA, that the individual is the only one who can do something and that the individual comes first. As for 6 months - he's gone longer than that, I believe, with the control, or maintenance, of his drinking - so maybe in the scheme of things, not so long.

I think Lincoln may be caught between his wife, whose hatred is so strong it makes her sick, and his logic. He loves her, so has to stand by her. And they still have the daughter. So Charlie is alone, not even family to help him.

[JudeS]

Charlie is typical of the "stinki thinkin" of the Alcoholic.
His daughter is there so HE won't be lonely rather than he, as the adult , is there to care for her.
In so many Alcoholic families the children are expected to fill the adults needs rather than the other way around.
Anyone who knows these families can cite how five, six and seven year olds take care of younger siblngs, do the cooking and feel responsible for the family.
Also, the lavish spending Charlie uses to assuage his guilty conscience is another way of making up for his inability to really care for his daughter. Money equals love to many disturbed individuals.

[BarbStAubrey]

reading this from Ms. Magazine cements my dislike of some writers in the 20s and 30s - there work may be world class outstanding but the price makes me cringe to the point of stomach turning.

"Indeed, Zelda, who was ultimately diagnosed with schizophrenia and died at an insane asylum, spent most of her marriage struggling to define herself as an artist and her own person. Her husband copied liberally from her journals and letters for his novels. When she finally wrote an autobiographical novel of her marriage in 1932, Save Me the Waltz, he edited out several of the stories that he intended to use for his own, 1934’s Tender Is the Night..."

[JoanP]

That's shocking, Barb, though not surprising. F. Scott was never able to recapture the magic, or match the success of his Great Gatsby written in 1925 -  no matter how hard he tried.
We've been trying to separate the author from his character Charlie Wales, but can't help but be reminded of the similarities.  It's kind of eerie to consider that this story was written in 1930 - and that Zelda didn't die until 1947.  He was writing this story while she was living - in the sanitorium!
I'm sitting here wondering why he wrote it...what motivated him?  Was he trying to prove to the family - (and to himsel) that he had really reformed, or maybe it was just  wishful thinking- hoping for a better life if only he could.

[JoanP]

 I didn't see Lorraine as a temptation...he says she seemed "trite, blurred, worn away."  Really doesn't want to have anything more to do with her - lonely as he is. Do you see the loneliness overcoming his good intentions, PatH?  I don't think he left his address at the Ritz bar for Lorraine, did he?  He just wanted to reconnect with familiar faces, as he saw no one he knew now?  Or maybe he knew Lorraine and her like would track him down.  He did avoid her direct requests for his address when she asked him for it.
 
Mixed feelings towards Marion, Marcie.   I saw her as a sister who was always jealous of her prettier, rich sister who had a gay old time in Paris.   Was Marion really "sick" after Lorraine's visit?  What kind of sick is this?  Is she really concerned about  about Honaria's welfare or jealous to learn that Charlie is making a comeback?
How cruel, telling Honaria she was going to live with dads dads dads.  Who is to tell her now that this is off?  And why?  (Do you wonder how Scottie Fitzgerald reacted to this story?)

I thought the best line in the story -

"He lost a lot in the crash, but everything he wanted in the boom."

The moral is there, no?

Thank you for bringing us this spirited discussion, Ella!  We'll stay open for more comments, but don't forget today we are beginning the discussion of Frank O'Connor's First Confession.  You won't want to miss this one either.