Gloria In F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Beautiful And Damned

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Gloria, one of the main characters in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Beautiful and Damned is the inspiration for the young character Serena Vanderwoodsen in the modern teenage drama “Gossip Girl.” Serena can be characterized as the modernized version of Gloria, as they are both wealthy, beautiful, city girls who have a sense of independence and are wild at times. The book is mentioned at various times throughout the six seasons of the show and the directors themselves have said that they were big fans of Fitzgerald’s work. Serena Vanderwoodsen is a wealthy teenage girl running around the streets of Manhattan. Because of her family’s money and name everything she’s ever wanted in life has been handed to her on a golden platter. During the first…show more content…
He, unlike his wife, sits around waiting for something to happen rather than going after it himself. Gloria is a gorgeous, wealthy woman who lives in the present and “has been so spoiled in a rather complete and unusual way”(40). Gloria was able to get whatever she wanted through either her beauty or her money and she enjoyed that. Gloria was almost obsessed with her beauty; she wanted to remain as beautiful for as long as she could, she wanted “to exist only as a conscious flower, prolonging and preserving herself”(1067). Gloria would constantly indulge in the pressing passion of the now and forget about the consequences of tomorrow; this made Gloria unique from the other girls Anthony knew or dated, she had a sense of independence. Now whether or not this was a false sense of independence can be debated because even though she claimed to be fine on her own she always had a man around. When Gloria walks into a room she captivates the people around her and she mesmerises them with her beauty and…show more content…
Serena can be best seen as Gloria when vacationing in Paris with Blair after leaving behind her complicated relationship situation and is “seeing many men and living in the moment”(pressler); Serena is living in the moment and captivating people around her with her beauty and presence which Gloria does on a daily basis. Fitzgerald describes Gloria’s normal state as “existing each day for each days’ worth” which can be seen in Serena during this season(147). The relationship between Anthony and Gloria can best be seen as the relationship between Chuck and Blair from “Gossip Girl”, but nonetheless Serena is more closely characterized on Gloria. They are each the it girls of their society; the popular, wealthy girls who can achieve what they desire just because of their beauty or their name. Serena does not always enjoy the kind of power she has because of who she and her family are but in some cases it comes in handy. Serena does try to work for things as the season progresses but she is still a little rich girl who can have anything with the snap of her fingers. However, Gloria has a realization near the end of the book that beauty is fading. Her and Anthony were looking at older buildings and she became suddenly offended by the idea of preservation and replies with, “ Beautiful things grow to a certain height and then they fail and fade off, breathing out memories as they decay...
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