Bright Star, Green Light

The Beautiful Works and Damned Lives of John Keats and F. Scott Fitzgerald

De: Jonathan Bate

Narrado por: Paul Hilliar

An immensely pleasurable biography of two interwoven, tragic figures: John Keats and F. Scott Fitzgerald

In this radiant dual biography, Jonathan Bate explores the fascinating parallel lives of John Keats and F. Scott Fitzgerald, writers who worked separately - on different continents, a century apart, in distinct genres - but whose lives uncannily echoed.

Not only was Fitzgerald profoundly influenced by Keats, titling Tender Is the Night and other works from the poet’s lines, but the two shared similar fates: Both died young, loved to drink, were plagued by tuberculosis, were haunted by their first love, and wrote into a new decade of release, experimentation, and decadence. Both were outsiders and Romantics, longing for the past as they sped blazingly into the future.

Using Plutarch’s ancient model of “parallel lives”, Jonathan Bate recasts the inspired lives of two of the greatest and best‑known Romantic writers. Commemorating both the bicentenary of Keats’ death and the centenary of the Roaring Twenties, this is a moving exploration of literary influence.

©2021 Jonathan Bate (P)2021 Blackstone Publishing

Loved it.

The narrator has the most adorable way of saying the word beautiful.
I was so dreading the ending of this book I wished it could have gone on for many, many more hours.
The cover illustration and photos of John Keats and F. Scott Fitzgerald were pleasing as well.
I will enjoy listening to this again in a few years.

Mixed Review

First, I love the brilliance and fine writing of Jonathan Bate. He is so wide read that he brings up all kinds of interesting points and perspectives during his discussion of literature. In this book I thought at first the comparison of Keats to Fitzgerald would be forced, but in fact he pulls it off.However, due to the paucity of excellent literature produced by each this book labored to cobble together a discussion of the two artists that still fell short of his considerations of Wordsworth and Shakespeare (the other Bat4es works I have read). But what really marred this audio book was the over dramatic reading of the narrator. Woven into this false drama were absolutely galling Scottish and American accents. I was glad to finish.