F. Scott Fitzgerald: The Love of the Last Tycoon: A Western (The Cambridge Edition of the Works of F. Scott Fitzgerald) (Hardcover)

by F. Scott Fitzgerald (Author), Matthew J. Bruccoli (Editor) "Though I haven't ever been on the screen I was brought up in pictures..." (more)
Key Phrases: latest typescripts, unwritten episodes, seventeen episodes, Wylie White, Last Tycoon, Miss Doolan (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Literary detective Bruccoli has produced a remarkable feat of scholarship in this welcome critical edition of the novel Fitzgerald began during his final year (1940) while working in Hollywood as a screenwriter. Generally considered a roman a clef, the story charts the power struggle of self-made, overworked producer Monroe Stahr (modeled on MGM producer Irving Thalberg) with rival executive Pat Brady (a stand-in for MGM head Louis B. Mayer). It is also the story of Stahr's love affair with young widow Kathleen Moore and is (partly at least) narrated by Cecelia, Brady's cynical daughter who is hopelessly in love with Stahr. After Fitzgerald's death in December, his conflicting drafts for the novel were reworked by Edmund Wilson, who spliced episodes, moved around scenes and altered words and punctuation. Bruccoli, Fitzgerald biographer and editor of Cambridge's critical edition of The Great Gatsby , has restored Fitzgerald's original version and has also restored the narrative's ostensible working title, one that implies that Hollywood is the last American frontier where immigrants and their progeny remake themselves. Equally significant are other entries in this volume: Bruccoli's informative introduction; letters by Fitzgerald, Wilson and Maxwell Perkins; facsimiles of Fitzgerald's notes and drafts; and textual commentary, including helpful explanations of the novel's numerous topical references.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Based loosely on the life of movie mogul Irving Thalberg, this novel was left unfinished in rough form at the time of Fitzgerald's death. Soon after, a flawed version was hastily released under the makeshift title The Last Tycoon , which has been the only available edition. Now, however, in this second installment in Cambridge's series of critical editions of Fitzgerald's works (Classic Returns, LJ 9/15/91), renowned Fitzgerald scholar Bruccoli has reassembled the 17 existing--out of 31 planned--episodes, according to Fitzgerald's intentions. The volume also includes an introduction by Bruccoli providing insight into the book's inception and history plus extensive information on the text, including facsimiles of the original manuscript pages, and a list of Fitzgerald's intended corrections and working notes. Though there are snatches of brilliance throughout, the text is not polished to the fine luster readers expect of an author of this caliber, but, coupled with Scott's notes, it provides a significant glimpse into the creative faculties of one of literature's preeminent minds. The Cambridge edition of The Love of the Last Tycoon is a superlative literary Christmas present. Essential for all serious literature collections.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 448 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press; Unexpurgated Ed edition (December 24, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 052140231X
• ISBN-13: 978-0521402316
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.8 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,325,891 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Recommended Reading, April 21, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: The Love of the Last Tycoon (Paperback)

Don't be mislead by the three-star rating. This was clearly going to be a four- or five-star book, except that Fitzgerald died after completing only the first 17 of 30 intended "episodes." The writing is his most economical since Gatsby, and the setting of Hollywood provides good fodder for Fitzgerald's recurring theme of scandal among the wealthy or celebrated. The story is related, for the most part, by a woman, the daughter of a well-known producer, about events that occurred five years ealier, when she was in college and in love with a dynamic young producer named Monroe Stahr. Though she loves him from a distance, her somewhat obsessive interest in the man is a useful way to relate his story. The writing was at times vintage Fitzgerald, sometimes recognizably unfinished, but always worth the experience. The notes, letters and outlines included in the version I read were extremely interesting and worth their inclusion. This is a book that I don't think anyone can read without saying, "I wish he had finished this." This is also a book that I recommend to anyone who appreciates and enjoys the writing of F. Scott Fitzgerald.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A glimpse of an artist at work, August 30, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Love of the Last Tycoon (Paperback)

Writers are endlessly second-guessing their work habits, their ideas and their purpose. As a novelist myself, I found this work-in-progress comforting, because it showed that even the greatest writers struggle with "The Process." Fitzgerald's inherent talent shines through, despite the incomplete nature of the work. The notes and other addenda helped shape the story even further for me, leaving it perhaps more fascinating for the wonder of what Fitzgerald might have done had he not died so young. I have groused in the past about the release of several Hemingway books after his death, and none has come close to the feeling of this unfinished work, but I cannot dispute the value to the reader of seeing these words, these last words, of one of America's greatest novelists. I am happy I got the chance.

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Luminous and Fresh, May 21, 2002

By	Winter 's "Killing Frost" - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Love of the Last Tycoon (Paperback)

It's really a shame that Fitzgerald never had the chance to finish this novel. Or, for that matter, to have written just a chapter or two more.

In Monroe Stahr, the hero and last tycoon, Fitzgerald has created a character to rival Gatsby's charisma--in fact, if Stahr had been more fully developed, as the working notes included with text hinted that he would have been, it's very possible that he would have exceeded Gatsby in that regard. Stahr is ultimately a compelling man of mixed personas, and because of such you care about him, you wonder at him, and you're almost happy that Fitzgerald was never able to doom him to the tragic ending that he had in mind.

The most wonderful aspect of this novel is that it seems to me as though Fitzgerald was taking some kind of risk with it. I cannot put my finger on exactly what makes this so, but there is a different mood, a different energy to it. It's like we're seeing what Fitzgerald could have been like, unburdened of care and freshly in love with writing and life. It's a side of this superb writer that I would have dearly liked to have seen more of.

I thoroughly enjoyed *The Love of the Last Tycoon*--I realized, perhaps even moreso than after reading Gatsby, that Fitzgerald's romanticism shines in everything that he does, adding a luminous quality to his prose that proved ellusive to a great number of his peers.