Review: Judy Jones is a tease. She toys with men, including Dexter. She always remains to him as that beautiful girl who is part of his illusions, his youth, unattainable. She comes back into his life several times, even causing him to ask her to marry him—an engagement that lasts about a month—when he is about to be engaged to another girl. But the whole beautiful illusion embodied in Judy Jones comes to an end seven years later, when, now married, with kids, she is judged by a man who knows her now, as having “faded.” Her beauty has faded, and Dexter’s youth is gone. All part of the illusion of the ephemeral, unattainable dreams of youth.
I love this sentence: “The little girl who had done this was eleven—beautifully ugly as little girls are apt to be who are destined, after a few years, to be inexpressibly lovely and bring no end of misery to a great number of men.”
Why read it? F. Scott Fitzgerald is the “poet” of the illusions of youth, regretful memories of the illusions of youth.
Short Story Masterpieces. Ed. RP Warren and A Erskine. New York
No comments:
Post a Comment