Flappers and Philosophers

by F. Scott Fitzgerald

"Is it the Russian bracelet that fascinates you?" "No, I'm merely trying to give you the sort of argument that would appeal to your intelligence. And I wish you'd go 'way,"

All life is just a progression toward, and then a recession from, one phrase—'I love you.'"

I distrust people who can be intense at this hour in the morning. It's a mild form of insanity—a sort of breakfast-food jag. Morning's the time to sleep, swim, and be careless."

"And courage to me meant ploughing through that dull gray mist that comes down on life—not only overriding people and circumstances but overriding the bleakness of living. A sort of insistence on the value of life and the worth of transient things."

Most of us are content to exist and breed and fight for the right to do both, and the dominant idea, the foredoomed attest to control one's destiny, is reserved for the fortunate or unfortunate few.

"Yes—because I couldn't ever marry you. You've a place in my heart no one else ever could have, but tied down here I'd get restless. I'd feel I was—wastin' myself. There's two sides to me, you see. There's the sleepy old side you love an' there's a sort of energy—the feeling that makes me do wild things. That's the part of me that may be useful somewhere, that'll last when I'm not beautiful any more."

"I'm sorry; that sounded worse than I meant it. You see I always think of people as feline or canine, irrespective of sex." "Which are you?" "I'm feline. So are you. So are most Southern men an' most of these girls here." "What's Harry?" "Harry's canine distinctly. Al the men I've to-night seem to be canine." "What does canine imply? A certain conscious masculinity as opposed to subtlety?" "Reckon so. I never analyzed it—only I just look at people an' say 'canine' or 'feline' right off. It's right absurd I guess." "Not at all. I'm interested. I used to leave a theory about these people. I think they're freezing up." "What?" "Well, they're growing' like Swedes—Ibsenesque, you know. Very gradually getting gloomy and melancholy. It's these long winters. Ever read Ibsen?" She shook her head. "Well, you find in his characters a cerulean brooding rigidity. They're righteous, narrow, and cheerless, without infinite possibilities for great sorrow or joy." "Without smiles or tears?" "Exactly. That's my theory. You see there are thousands of Swedes up here. They come, I imagine, because the climate is very much like their own, and there's been a gradual mingling. There're probably not half a dozen here to-night, but—we've had four Swedish governors. Am I boring you?"