The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Other Jazz Age Stories (68 page)

1
how's Carmen from the South? . . . How's—how's Dangerous Dan McGrew?:
The interplay between Sally Carroll and her dancing partner makes reference to the heroine of Bizet's opera
Carmen,
a nomadic smuggler, and the protagonist of Robert Service's poem about an Alaskan adventurer and gambler slain by a rival over “the lady that's known as Lou” (see note #4 below under “Dalyrimple Goes Wrong”).

2
Ibsen:
Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906), Norwegian dramatist and poet known for the stark, gloomy realism of his mature plays.

3
“Peer Gynt”:
Play by Ibsen recounting the protagonist's allegorical wandering through life in search of the self and the existential crisis wrought by that search.

4
Serbia:
As today, in the early twentieth century, the site of ethnic conflicts in the wake of the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian empire that many historians consider to be the spark that ignited World War I.

1
Cæsar, Cicero, Vergil, Xenophon, Homer, Algebra, Plane Geometry, Solid Geometry, and Chemistry:
Classical authors and disciplines that were considered parts of the foundation of a liberal arts education at Princeton during the time that Fitzgerald matriculated there.

2
George M. Cohan:
Actor, singer, and composer (1878-1942) best known for his Broadway musicals and patriotic songs such as “Over There” and “I'm a Yankee Doddle Dandy.”

3
Châuteau-Thierry:
Site of intensive military buildup and confrontation between German and U.S. troops during World War I.

4
“The Pragmatic Bias of the New Realists” . . . “Spinoza's Improvement of the Understanding . . . “German Idealism”:
Together, the references reveal Horace to be interested in a hodgepodge of philosophical traditions, ranging from the rationalism of the Renaissance Italian philosopher, Spinoza, to nineteenth-century German romanticists such as Schiller and Schilling, to the modern pragmatism of American philosophers such as Dewey and William James (see note #24 below).

5
Pall Malls:
Popular brand of cigarettes.

6
Berkeley . . . Hume:
George Berkeley (1685-1753) and David Hume (1711-1776), respectively, British and Scottish empiricist philosophers.

7
Omar Khayyam:
Persian poet, mathematician, and astronomer (1048?- 1122) whose philosophical love poem, the
Rubáiyát,
received wide popularity when it was translated into English by Edward Fitzgerald in the nineteenth century.

8
Florodora Sextette:
A reference to the six actresses who portrayed the “Pretty Maidens” of
Florodora,
a 1900 Broadway smash musical, all of whom eventually married millionaires.

9
Uncle Remus:
The fictional narrator of a series of Southern folktales gathered and retold by Joel Chandler Harris (1848-1908) containing such characters as Brer Rabbit and Brer Fox.

10
Catullus:
Classical lyric poet (c. 84-54 BC) known for his love poetry.

11
with Bergsonian trimmings:
The reference suggests that Horace's fictional mentor, Anton Laurier, is indebted to Henri Bergson (1859-1941), a French philosopher known for his melding of science and metaphysics in producing modern theories of time, space, will, and creation.

12
“The Bohemian Girl”:
Light opera by the Irish composer Michael William Balfe (1808-1870).

13
attar of roses:
A perfume.

14
Nabiscoes:
Tea biscuits made by the company better known now for its cereals.

15
Divinerries' . . . Palais Royal:
Popular entertainment theaters.

16
the style was like Carlyle's:
A reference to Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881), Scottish essayist, philosopher, and social critic.

17
St. Vitus dance:
A form of chorea, a disease that inflicts nervous disorders often involving involuntary, spasmodic bodily movements.

18
Kipling and O. Henry:
Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936) was an English novelist and short-story writer whose colonial tales and poems, collected in
The Jungle Book,
were enormously popular in the late Victorian and early modern eras. O. Henry (the pseudonym of William Sydney Porter, 1862-1910) achieved great popularity as a short-story writer upon whose signature surprise endings Fitzgerald modeled some of his early stories; with its symmetrical reversal of fortune, “Head and Shoulders” bears clear structural resemblance to many of O. Henry's stories.

19
Herb Spencer:
A joking reference to the philosopher Herbert Spencer (1820-1903), associated with Darwin as a proponent of scientific theories of creation and evolution.

20
“Pepys' Diary”:
The record of seventeenth-century London life maintained by English civil servant Samuel Pepys (1633-1703); the
Diary
will serve as the parodic source of inspiration for Marcia's literary efforts.

21
Mens sana in corpore sano:
Famous epigraph; translated from Latin, it means “healthy in mind, healthy in body.”

22
quod erat demonstrandum:
Translated from Latin, it means “that which was to be demonstrated,” i.e., concluded.

23
Prometheus:
Greek Titan who stole the gift of fire from the gods and whose punishment was being chained to a rock for eternity while birds pecked out his intestines.

24
Schopenhaur . . . William James:
Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860), a German philosopher on morality and will who expressed a pessimistic view of the universe; William James (1842-1910), one of the leading proponents of American pragmatism, a philosophy that combines the logic of empiricism with the relativism of interpretation theory.

1
Bobs:
The central action in the story refers to the popular short hair style for “flappers.”

2
Hiram Johnson . . . Ty Cobb:
Hiram Johnson (1866-1945) was a highly visible, progressive Republican politician who held office as the governor of California and was Theodore Roosevelt's running mate in a failed bid for the presidency in 1912; he favored reform, women's rights, and New Deal domestic programs. Tyrus Raymond (“Ty”) Cobb (1886-1961) is considered by many to be the greatest baseball player of all time; he spent most of his career playing as an outfielder for the Detroit Tigers and was the first man to be elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

3
Annie Fellows Johnston:
Author (1863-1931) of popular, often sentimental children's fiction.

4
“Little Women”:
The well-known novel about the March family and middle-class life in nineteenth-century New England written by Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888); the novel has maintained its enormous popularity for well over a century since its publication in 1868.

5
League of Nations:
The predecessor to the United Nations created after World War I to promote international peace and diplomacy; the formation of the League of Nations remained a disputed political issue throughout the twenties and thirties.

6
Oscar Wilde:
Controversial author (1854-1900) whose work includes social satires such as the play
The Importance of Being Earnest
and a portrait of the travails of modern identity in the novel
The Picture of Dorian Gray.
Bernice quotes Wilde here in order to be shocking.

1
its Victorian architecture or its Edward VII additions, or even its Woodrow Wilsonian, patented, last-a-century roofing:
Fitzgerald is describing the monastery as a jumble of architectural styles, ranging from the Victorian to the modern (Edwardian) and utilitarian (Wilsonian).

2
thick volumes of Thomas Aquinas and Henry James and Cardinal Mercier and Immanuel Kant:
The serious reading of the monks ranges from systematic theology (Aquinas and Mercier) to high modern fiction ( James) and German philosophy (Kant).

3
shimmys . . . maxixe:
Popular dances of the day.

4
Benediction:
Catholic religious ceremony devoted to honoring the Blessed Sacrament.

5
St. Francis Xavier:
Catholic missionary (1506-1552) who, along with St. Ignatius Loyola, founded the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits), whose members inhabit the monastery in the story.

6
“O Salutaris Hostia”:
Hymn that accompanies the ceremony of Benediction.

1
Montaigne's essays and Samuel Butler's note-books—and a little of Tolstoi and Marcus Aurelius:
The list reveals some of Fitzgerald's Princeton reading, which he deemed ideal for the disillusioned modernist, including the secular, personal essays of Montaigne, the scientific, satirical humanism of Butler's writings, the realism of Tolstoi's novels, and the stoicism of the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius.

2
Lewis gun:
The first machine gun developed to be fired from an airplane, used during World War I.

3
General Pershing and Sergeant York:
John Joseph “Black Jack” Pershing (1860-1948) was a commander of the allied armies during World War I and its most decorated officer; Alvin Cullum York (1887-1964), an enlistee, is the best known and most highly decorated fighting hero of World War I.

4
Robert Service:
Canadian author (1874-1958) of tall-tale poems set in the Yukon and Alaska, such as “The Shooting of Dan McGrew” and “The Cremation of Sam McGee.”

5
Mutt and Jeff:
Syndicated cartoon strip that began running in 1908, portraying the adventures of two bumbling clowns.

6
Byronic . . . Don Juan . . . Faust:
References to icons of rebellion and defiance. The British Romantic poet George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) wrote
Don Juan,
an epic poem of “spiritual” rebellion; Faust is the defiant magician of German legend who sells his soul for divine knowledge (“the philosophical rebel”), most famously depicted in Goethe's long dramatic poem of that title.

1
code of neckties and tallyhos:
The code of gentlemen who wear neckties and engage in fox hunts.

2
congé:
Sign of dismissal.

1
Mason-Dixon line:
The geographical boundary that separates Pennsylvania from West Virginia and Maryland, and thus, symbolically, the North from the South.

2
Rolling the bones:
Gambling with dice.

3
Liberty bonds:
Government bonds sold to support the war effort.

4
Lady Diane Manners:
Famous British actress at the time of World War I and considered by many to be the greatest beauty of her day; Nancy Lamar seems to have confused her with Lady Godiva.

5
flivver:
A small, cheap automobile.

6
Joe Miller's “Slow Train thru Arkansas,” “Lucille” . . . “The Eyes of the World,” by Harold Bell Wright, and an ancient prayer-book of the Church of England:
The Jelly-bean's reading consists of popular books about the West, including what I take to be the work of Joaquin (or “Joe”) Miller (1837-1913), whose poems depict stereotypical views of the American West, and Harold Bell Wright (1872-1944), a California minister turned author who wrote novels set in the Ozarks and the Southwest.

1
Buster Brown collar:
A stiff shirt collar usually worn by young boys.

2
new nationalities:
A reference to the reconfiguration of national boundaries and the creation of new national entities in the wake of World War I.

3
Kismet:
Fate.

1
May Day:
The title refers to May 1, the day upon which workers' marches and socialist celebrations take place worldwide.

2
Delmonico's:
Famous New York City restaurant and nightclub.

3
Prohibition was not yet:
Prohibition of the sale of alcohol did not begin until passage of the Twenty-First Amendment in 1919, but as indicated, the sale of liquor to soldiers was made illegal during World War I.

4
J. P. Morgan an' John D. Rockerfeller:
A reference to John Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913) and John D. Rockefeller (1839-1937), both industrialists who helped finance the war effort.

5
Bolsheviki:
A reference to the Russian revolution of 1917 in which the proletarian Bolshevik Party seized power and deposed Emperor Nicholas II; a “Bolshevik,” “Bolsheviki,” or “Red” was consequently used derogatorily in the United States to designate workers, labor party members, and political progressives and radicals of all kinds.

6
Shell hole:
A coward; one who avoids fighting by diving into a bunker or shell hole.

7
delouser:
Process by which lice and other vermin were removed from soldiers.

8
Pump and Slipper:
Annual Yale ball for undergraduates.

9
Maxfield Parrish moonlight:
Parrish (1870-1966) was a widely known American painter and magazine illustrator whose signature is easily recognized in the lush, colorful, faintly surrealistic qualities of his work.

10
As
immortal Christopher:
The statue of Christopher Columbus in New York City's Columbus Circle; the reference to this icon of discovery and freedom is ironic in the context of Fitzgerald's portrait of a May Day in New York torn by strife and concluding with a suicide.