687 Gatsby Turns 100 (with James West)

The History of Literature

Jacke Wilson

History, Books, Arts

4.6 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 17 March 2025

⏱️ 53 minutes

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Summary

"I want to write something new," American author F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote in a letter to his editor, "something extraordinary and beautiful and simple and intricately patterned." Months later, he presented the results: the novel that would eventually be titled The Great Gatsby. Published in 1925 to middling success, the book has since become a candidate for the Great American Novel, selling more than copies in a month than the book sold during Fitzgerald's entire lifetime. In this episode, Jacke talks to Fitzgerald scholar James West about his work editing the Cambridge Centennial Edition of The Great Gatsby, which celebrates 100 years of this enduring tale of illicit desire, grand illusions, and lost dreams, delivered in lyric prose by an author writing at the peak of his powers. Additional listening: 281 The Great Gatsby 167 F. Scott Fitzgerald 539 Tender Is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald (with Mike Palindrome) The music in this episode is by Gabriel Ruiz-Bernal. Learn more at gabrielruizbernal.com. Help support the show at patreon.com/literature or historyofliterature.com/donate. The History of Literature Podcast is a member of Lit Hub Radio and the Podglomerate Network. Learn more at thepodglomerate.com/historyofliterature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	The History of Literature Podcast is a member of the Podglomerate Network and Lit Hub Radio.
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0:17.7	The Smithsonian's flagship podcast, Side Door, will sneak you behind the scenes of the world's
0:23.6	largest museum and research complex. Come learn about the ghosts that supposedly walk the museum
0:29.7	halls after dark. How a train robbery gave rise to criminal forensics, why leeches are actually
0:35.8	the coolest thing ever, and how to get away with murder in the
0:39.1	Arctic. Maybe. You'll discover stories of history, science, art, and culture you won't find in a
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1:34.1	Hello, when American writer F. Scott Fitzgerald died of a heart attack at age 44, his novel, The Great Gatsby had fallen out of the public eye, having sold fewer than 25,000
1:39.2	copies in its 15 years of existence. Today, the book has been purchased more than 25 million times
1:47.0	and continues to sell a half a million copies a year.
1:51.0	This year marks the centenary of the book, often viewed as one of the great American novels,
1:56.0	perhaps the greatest.
1:58.0	Gatsby Turns 100 with James West, the editor of a special new edition of the book,
	...

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