Fitzgerald, F. Scott - Susan F. Beegel (essay date 1996)
Susan F. Beegel (essay date 1996)
SOURCE: Beegel, Susan F. “‘Bernice Bobs Her Hair’: Fitzgerald's Jazz Elegy for Little Women.” In New Essays on F. Scott Fitzgerald's Neglected Stories, edited by Jackson R. Bryer, pp. 58-73. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1996.
[In the following essay, Beegel contends that Fitzgerald borrows the key plot elements and thematic concerns for his story “Bernice Bobs Her Hair” from Louisa May Alcott's Little Women.]
In 1915 nineteen-year-old F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote a remarkable letter to his younger sister Annabel, criticizing her social deportment and arguing that a successful debutante's popularity is composed of a concerted appeal to male egotism (“Boys like to talk about themselves … always pay close attention to the man.”) and accomplished acting (“Your natural laugh is good, but your artificial one is bum.”) Abandoning the traditional role of elder brother as...
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