From AudioFile
THE GREAT GATSBY, F. Scott Fitzgerald's snapshot of the decadence and excess of the Jazz Age, is a literary classic that has been frequently and successfully performed on both screen and stage. Although Gatsby has been recorded previously on audio, Tim Robbins's reading is surely one of the best. Robbins excels in giving each of the characters a distinct persona, conveying emotion with an almost elegant sense of detachment. The final tape contains letters from Fitzgerald to his agent, and others, about the book. These candid letters are fascinating, and Robert Sean Leonard reads them with the smugness one would expect from Fitzgerald. The letters add a different, and fascinating, perspective to Fitzgerald and the times in which he lived. D.J.S. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award, 2003 Audie Award Finalist © AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

Book Description

The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald's portrait of the Jazz Age in all its decadence and excess, is, as editor Maxwell Perkins praised it in 1924, "a wonder." It remains one of the most widely read, translated, admired, imitated and studied twentieth-century works of American fiction.

This deceptively simple work, Fitzgerald's best known, was hailed by critics as capturing the spirit of the generation. In Jay Gatsby, Fitzgerald embodies some of America's strongest obsessions: wealth, power, greed, and the promise of new beginnings.

The recording includes a selection of letters written by Fitzgerald to his editor, Maxwell Perkins, his agent, Harold Ober, and friends and associates, including Willa Cather, H.L. Mencken, John Peale Bishop and Gertrude Stein.

Performed by Tim Robbins

About the Author
F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940) published This Side of Paradise in 1920 and that same year married Zelda Sayre. Fitzgerald was one of the major literary voices in the twentieth century, the writer of such masterpieces as The Great Gatsby, The Beautiful and the Damned, and Tender Is the Night.

ANNOTATION

The timeless story of Jay Gatsby and his love for Daisy Buchanan is widely acknowledged to be the closest thing to the Great American Novel ever written.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

One of the classics of twentieth-century literature, The Great Gatsby is now available in a definitive, textually accurate edition.

The story of the fabulously wealthy Jay Gatsby and his love for the beautiful Daisy Buchanan has been acclaimed by generations of readers. But the first edition contained a number of errors resulting from Fitzgerald's extensive revisions and a rushed production schedule. Subsequent printings introduced further departures from the author's words. This edition, based on the Cambridge critical text, restores all the language of Fitzgerald's masterpiece. Drawing on the manuscript and surviving proof of the novel, along with Fitzgerald's later revisions and corrections, this is the authorized text - The Great Gatsby as Fitzgerald intended it.

SYNOPSIS

Many consider The Great Gatsby the closest thing to the Great American Novel ever written. First published in 1925, it is the timeless story of Jay Gatsby and his love for Daisy Buchanan. Gatsby lives in the New York suburb of West Egg, where those with "new money" reside. Gatsby's mansion is right across the bay from the home of his wartime love, Daisy Buchanan, pictured always in white.

Gatsby seeks to keep his illusion of Daisy as perfect alive. He uses his money, gained through illegal means, to do so, and uses his neighbor, Nick Carroway, to try to reach Daisy. The love of money as the root of evil is a pervading theme.

FROM THE CRITICS

Edwin C. Clark

. . . It expresses one phase of the great grotesque spectacle of our American scene. It is humor, irony, ribaldry, pathos and loveliness. . . . A curious book, a mystical, glamorous story of today. It takes a deeper cut at life than hitherto has been essayed by Mr. Fitzgerald. He writes well -- he always has -- for he writes naturally, and his sense of form is becoming perfected. -- Books of the Century; New York Times review, April 1925

Publishers Weekly

Readers in that sizeable group of people who think The Great Gatsby is the Great American Novel will be delighted with Robbins's subtle, brainy and immensely touching new reading. There have been audio versions of Gatsby before this-by Alexander Scourby and Christopher Reeve, to name two-but actor/director Robbins brings a fresh and bracing vision that makes the story gleam. From the jaunty irony of the title page quote ("Lover, gold-hatted, high-bouncing lover, I must have you!") to the poetry of Fitzgerald's ending about "the dark fields of the republic" and "boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past," Robbins conjures up a sublime portrait of a lost world. And as a bonus, the excellent audio actor Robert Sean Leonard reads a selection of Fitzgerald's letters to editors, agents and friends which focus on the writing and selling of the novel. Listeners will revel in learning random factoids, e.g., in 1924, Scott and Zelda were living in a Rome hotel that cost just over $500 a month, and he was respectfully suggesting that his agent Harold Ober ask $15,000 from Liberty magazine for the serial rights to Gatsby. (Oct.) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

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