Lessons From The Age of Excess

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Few writers have captured the psychology of money as completely as F. Scott Fitzgerald. Most of us know that name from reading The Great Gatsby in high school. But like most 16-year-olds, my brain was nowhere near ready to grasp the depth of Fitzgerald’s masterpiece. It wasn’t until later that I reread some of his stuff and became fascinated.

While he explored a bunch of themes, one topic that consistently occupied Fitzgerald's mind was money. And it wasn’t just the mansions and fancy parties — he delved deep into the human condition, unraveling the impact of money on happiness, relationships, and the pursuit of the American Dream.

Born in 1896, Fitzgerald saw firsthand the rise of the Roaring Twenties, an era defined by opulence and material excess which served as the backdrop of his stories.

The interesting part is that Fitzgerald's writing was a reflection of his own life. Like a character in one of his novels, he had a complex relationship with wealth, teetering between desire and disillusionment.

Fitzgerald was both an avid participant in, and a firm critic of the 1920’s hedonistic culture. It’s what made him the perfect storyteller. He took his own experiences and poured them into his characters, crafting narratives that peeled back their psychology.

Fitzgerald's upbringing in the middle class shaped his fascination with wealth. When he attended Princeton, he did so with the limited family money his mother had, which was far less than what his classmates had.

He became fascinated with their lavish lifestyles but like the characters in his books, Fitzgerald's involvement was limited by his social status. That's when he met his first love, Ginevra King, whom he saw as his gateway into that world.

Unfortunately, Ginevra's father wasn't thrilled about his daughter marrying a poor guy, so they ended up breaking up. Fitzgerald took it personally and saw it as evidence of a caste system that made the American Dream feel unattainable.

Interestingly though, Fitzgerald’s infatuation with wealth stayed with him for the rest of his life. He explored the belief that wealth could provide the key to happiness and acceptance. The resulting set of novels document the development of one of the most complex and fascinating authors in history.

The World According to F. Scott Fitzgerald

Fitzgerald wrote his first book, This Side of Paradise, at the age of 22. It’s the story of a middle class kid attending Princeton, hellbent on climbing the social ladder only to discover that it’s not as fulfilling as he imagined.

The rich girl he gets involved with, inspired by Ginevra King, breaks up with him because he's not wealthy enough. Fitzgerald portrays his own struggles and disillusionment through this novel, exploring how money can corrupt relationships and fail to bring happiness or acceptance. As the main character, Amory, puts it, "I know myself, but that is all."

The book catapulted Fitzgerald to fame, selling nearly 50,000 copies and securing the ‘love’ of his now wife Zelda. In 1922, the couple dove headfirst into New York’s high society.

His second novel, The Beautiful and Damned draws upon this early phase of their marriage, depicting characters Anthony and Gloria, who live a privileged yet purposeless existence. The couple compensates for their lack of purpose by indulging in heavy partying, but deep down, their souls suffocate.

Fitzgerald aimed to demonstrate that an American could lead an empty life while warning of its dangers. As the couple’s social standing collapses, Fitzgerald captures their desperation, echoing his own fears about the precarious nature of money.

Fitzgerald once wrote, "The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function."

He called it "double vision”. Fitzgerald wanted readers to emotionally invest in his stories while still maintaining the ability to objectively criticize it.

It was an ideal he was gunning for in his writing, but he had difficulty emotionally distancing himself from the protagonist’s struggle. Why? Because those protagonists were modeled after himself.

But in 1925, something shifted. Fitzgerald was five years removed from his heartbreak with Ginevra, giving him the necessary perspective to be an objective narrator. Yet, the memories of Ginevra's world were still vivid enough for him to embody the struggling protagonist.

Fitzgerald reached the pivotal point in his writing career that allowed him to function with two opposing ideas in his head: the perspectives of both Nick Carraway and Jay Gatsby.

Double vision is the brilliance behind his masterpiece, The Great Gatsby. The novel is Fitzgerald’s attempt to grapple with his conflicting feelings about the Roaring Twenties. He uses double vision to not only work through his own contradictions, but to show us the complexity of human emotion.

Fitzgerald wanted readers to believe in the possibility that Gatsby will and will not win Daisy, that money is a force for good and a force for evil, and that anyone can and cannot access the best of America.

What financial lessons can we learn from Fitzgerald's work?

1. The seduction of money masks the cost of its acquisition.

Money can be a worthwhile endeavor, but a singular pursuit often ends up intertwined with our identity. It becomes the yardstick by which we measure our value in society.

Jay Gatsby strives to build wealth as a means of redefining himself. He craves validation through material success, throwing extravagant parties and flaunting his lifestyle. But beneath the glitz and glamour there’s an emptiness and a longing for something deeper. Gatsby's pursuit of money leads him down a path of deception, illegal activities, and a shallow existence.

It ultimately becomes his tragic downfall, highlighting that the cost of acquiring wealth is not just measured in dollars and cents.

The irony becomes even more apparent at Gatsby's funeral, where the man who seemed to have it all — parties with hundreds of guests and contacts over the world — is left utterly alone.

2. An emphasis on excess burdens the human spirit and magnifies voids.

When we immerse ourselves in excessive desires, we overlook the voids that demand our attention.

Fitzgerald’s work unveiled a world where the affluent danced on a tightrope between decadence and emptiness, showcasing the dark side of excess.

The America Fitzgerald depicts in The Beautiful and Damned is obsessed with becoming wealthy. And those who are already wealthy dream of becoming wealthier.

Anthony and Gloria show the cycle of dissatisfaction created by the constant dream of something better. They are convinced that fulfillment of the American dream involves no work, so contentment remains just out of their grasp. The couple descends into moral decay after relying on more and more wealth to provide them happiness and purpose.

Fitzgerald’s characters embodied the hollowness of those who believed that wealth could fill the void within. It teaches us that unchecked desires, while enticing, can be an insurmountable barrier to our ultimate happiness.

3. Desire and disillusionment are close cousins.

Desire and disillusionment both stem from the pursuit of fulfillment and the gap between our expectations and reality.

Fitzgerald's characters wanted to break free from their circumstances and prove themselves worthy. But in their pursuits, they became disillusioned as they discover that money can’t buy everything they desire.

Amory from This Side of Paradise is initially charmed by luxury but learns things he doesn’t like about those he admired. His classmate, Dick, is killed in a car accident and Amory realizes that Dick’s money couldn’t protect him from death. He also learns that, when his college fling leaves to marry a wealthier man, money often infuses a superficiality into relationships.

Gatsby too desired the idea of money. He once described Daisy in saying, “Her voice is full of money”, suggesting a seductive quality that money holds.

But his desire melts into pure disillusion as he uses money as a tool to fix the mistakes of his past and buy a forgotten future, famously saying, “Can't repeat the past? ... Why of course you can!”.

Nick Carraway summed up Gatsby's elusive desires in saying, "Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgiastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that's no matter—tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther."

- Sam

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