Status Updates From Flappers and Philosophers

“The Four Fists”

This is the anatomy of a man named Samuel. Each fist is a time in his life where he was violently corrected in the process of overstepping his bounds. Each time he committed to introspection and corrected the behaviors that led to getting socked in the jaw. In the end, while he makes a poor “business” decision, he proves himself of such character that his firm’s trust in him eclipses it.

“Dalyrimple Goes Wrong”

A war veteran returns home and talks himself into living a life of crime while working a grueling dead-end job and railing at the nepotism he sees, robbing people in his hometown and finding a hollow elation after the thrill of the crime is over, rendering performative but remorseful gestures like returning mistakenly pilfered false teeth, one of the story’s best moments.

“Benediction”

The Catholic side of Fitzgerald blooms in this short story where a young libertine woman pays a visit to her brother, who has been training to become a priest for about as long as she’s been alive. The story has a weird undertone to my jaundiced 2026 eyes but I don’t think that it was intended to be anything but sweet, with some insight as to why people prefer priests of certain backgrounds.

“Bernice Bobs Her Hair”

Bernice just wants to be popular at the dances, so she takes notes from her social butterfly of a cousin, Marjorie. Everything’s fine until she gets the undivided attention of the one boy Marjorie has been stringing along for ages. The ensuing war has no victors, only victims. Well, I guess Bernice’s revenge is a… morale victory, I suppose.

“The Cut-Glass Bowl”

A weird story that is a parable about basically reaping what you sew. In this case, Evelyn was beautiful but cold as ice. A gentleman gives her a gift on being spurned and it’s pretty but it has a hand in the unraveling of her good fortune: the simplicity of her marriage, her husband’s temperance, her daughter’s ableness, and even the life of her soldier son.

“Head and Shoulders”

A haughtily brainy college student on a lark is set up with a singing and dancing beauty. She thaws him and he woos her and the two of them end up married. As they go through life, their positions change, with him as a talented gymnast and her as a critically acclaimed author. The final punch of the story is that it’s all fun for him until his own faculties are dismissed by the public.

“The Ice Palace”

Fitzgerald, who was born in Minnesota, married a Southern Belle from Georgia. The Sally of this story is a Georgian girl who goes to her Northern Fiancé’s hometown and finds herself gradually at odds with everything about the North, culminating in a terrifying entombment in the pitch-black passages of the labyrinth at the bottom of the Ice Palace.

“The Offshore Pirate”

Affluent 19 yr old party girl’s uncle’s yacht is commandeered by a curious band of pirates with an unusual leader, and she decides that she is going to have way more fun tagging along with the pirates than going back to the care of her fuddy-duddy uncle and aunt. A romance of circumstances ensues. You can see where his short story writing differs from his novels.