The Great Gatsby and the 1920's: Fitzgerald and the Jazz Age (including Bix)

The offshore pirate -- The ice palace -- Head and shoulders -- The cut-glass bowl -- Bernice bobs her hair -- Benediction -- Dalyrimple goes wrong -- The four fists -- The jelly-bean -- The camel's back -- May Day -- Porcelain and pink -- The diamond as big as the Ritz -- The curious case of Benjamin Button -- Tarquin of Cheapside -- "O Russet witch!" -- The lees of happiness -- Mr. Icky -- Jemina.

For the magazine's centenary celebration, an anthology of pieces from the early golden age of Vanity Fair. Editor Graydon Carter introduces these fabulous pieces written between 1913 and 1936, when the magazine published a murderers' row of the world's leading literary lights. It features great writers on great topics, including F. Scott Fitzgerald on what a magazine should be, Clarence Darrow on equality, D. H. Lawrence on women, e.e. cummings on Calvin Coolidge, John Maynard Keynes on the collapse in money value, Thomas Mann on how films move the human heart, Alexander Woollcott on Harpo Marx, Carl Sandburg on Charlie Chaplin, Djuna Barnes on James Joyce, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., on Joan Crawford, and Dorothy Parker on a host of topics ranging from why she hates actresses to why she hasn't married. These essays reflect the rich period of their creation while simultaneously addressing topics that would be recognizable in the magazine today, such as how women should navigate work and home life; our destructive fascination with the entertainment industry and with professional sports; the collapse of public faith in the financial industry; and, as Aldous Huxley asks herein, "What, exactly, is modern?

A biography of the cornet player from Davenport, Iowa, who helped raise jazz to a respected musical form and who was inducted into the International Jazz Hall of Fame in 1997.

Chronicles the life and career of Bix Beiderbecke, from his beginnings as a child prodigy to his death at age 28. Includes film footage, photos, and interviews with Louis Armstrong, Hoagy Carmichael, Bill Challis, Doc Cheatam, Charlie Davis, Jack Fulton, Matty Malneck, Artie Shaw, and Spiegle Willcox.