"The Love of the Last Tycoon" by F. Scott Fitzgerald: One of my personal favorites, F. Scott Fitzgerald is conspicuously absent from the pages of 70 proof. See, I only review books I'm reading at the moment, and not works I've read in the past. And by the time I started 70 proof, I had already read four of Fitzgerald's five novels.
Yet despite my admiration for the author, I could never bring myself to read his fifth and final book, "The Love of the Last Tycoon," because Fitzgerald died before he could finish it. I never thought it was fair to read someone's unfinished work. Who can say what Fitzgerald had planned? All the notes in the world can't express what was going through his mind at the time of his death. He could have woken up on the fateful morning of his fatal heart attack and decided to completely rewrite the manuscript, his true intentions taken to the grave.
But I eventually had a change of heart, deciding it's better to experience all the Fitzgerald I can during my short life rather than live and die with the unknown.
Originally published as "The Last Tycoon" in 1941, one year after its author's unexpected death, scholars have now concluded Fitzgerald intended the book to be called "The Love of the Last Tycoon," wanting it to sound more like a Hollywood movie title. And 1930s Hollywood, a world with which Fitzgerald was intimately familiar from his years as a screenwriter, is the setting for the story.
Unlike Fitzgerald's other novels, this one is narrated by a woman, Celia Brady, the daughter of a famous movie producer. When the book opens, Celia is flying back home to visit her father, returning from college back east. She's sharing the plane with other Hollywood types, including Wylie White, a screenwriter, and a Mr. Schwartze, who's the head of a struggling movie company. Celia goes largely unnoticed until the others learn she's Pat Brady's daughter, and then they're quick to befriend her, with the trio venturing off together to explore the town when their plane is forced to make an emergency landing in Nashville. Only Celia and Wylie return to the plane. Schwartze asks Wylie to deliver a note to a fellow traveler named Mr. Smith, and then goes off on his own to kill himself. The movie business ain't no boat ride.
It's not until Wylie passes along the note that Celia realizes the mysterious Mr. Smith is actually Monroe Stahr, her father's partner and the hottest young producer in Hollywood. Celia has long been infatuated with Stahr, even though he's 15 years her senior. Celia spends the rest of the book distantly observing, and loving, Stahr much as Nick Carraway chronicled the greatness of Gatsby. Even though Celia can't possibly be privy to certain aspects of the story, she resides as a first person omniscient narrator, seemingly imagining the scenes she isn't there to witness.
Stahr is a driven, ambitious businessman who's achieved the American dream of wealth and fame through individual discipline. A widower, Stahr's maniacal devotion to work is compromising his health, and disputes with Celia's father and other aspects of Hollywood are threatening his very existence. In the midst of all the professional chaos, Stahr falls in love with a young girl named Kathleen who is the spitting image of his dead wife. The two have a brief, passionate affair, but Kathleen is already engaged to another man. Dames are trouble.
And that's more or less where Fitzgerald's death halted the book. Once again, it isn't fair to judge the unfinished product, especially in the case of Fitzgerald, who was notorious for relentless rewrites. And there's definitely plenty of work to be done.
Some critics have actually gone on record as saying "The Love of the Last Tycoon," had it been completed, could have surpassed "The Great Gatsby." That's just insanity. Even if each sentence was crafted to perfection, it would still come off as a cheap copy of the earlier masterpiece.
Monroe Stahr is a watered-down version of Jay Gatsby. Much as Gatsby tried to recapture the past in pursuing Daisy, Stahr is hoping to relive the past in courting a woman who resembles his wife. Stahr's introduction also mirrors Gatsby's, with characters talking about him and building up an air of mystery before he ever makes an appearance. And I've already mentioned the parallels between Celia Brady and Nick Carraway.
The writing also contains an element of racism, particularly towards Jews and African Americans, which is somewhat unnerving. Here's hoping it was merely a frank portrayal of Hollywood and not an insight into the author's beliefs.
While I wasn't impressed with the actual story, reading "The Love of the Last Tycoon" was still a fascinating experience, due mostly to the extensive notes that accompany the unfinished manuscript. Included are Fitzgerald's character sketches, chapter summaries, random notes, and even a nifty book outline presented in a real swank chart format. It's a unique chance to see how a true literary genius went about constructing a novel.
It's worth mentioning that, according to his notes, Fitzgerald only intended the finished novel to be around 60,000 words. The version currently in print is already close to 70,000, even though it barely comprises the first half of the book's outline. So that would seem to verify my suspicion that the presented work would have received some serious editing before Fitzgerald considered it completed.
Of course, not everything about the notes is inspiring. Reading Fitzgerald's plans for the remainder of the book is rather depressing, as it threatened to spiral into hackneyed cliches and Hollywood schlock.
Even if the book had been completed, I couldn't possibly see giving it more than three shots. But it's definitely worth picking up just for the privileged view into Fitzgerald's creative process.
RATING: 